A Wild Night and A New Road
by PlayerPiano
Summary: As the song says, we all end up the remains of the day. But what were the Downstairs residents like when they were Upstairs? A series of vignettes about the lives, deaths, and afterlives of some notable residents of the Land of the Dead.
1. Bonejangles and His Bone Boys

(_Disclaimer: I don't own these characters, I don't own any rights, I am unaffiliated, I am making no money, please do not sue me.)_

**Bonejangles and His Bone Boys**

Billy "Bowler" Morton tapped his foot in time to the fresh new tune running through his head. He held a newspaper page on his knee, quickly scratching down notes in the margins with a stub of pencil. Chords flew from his brain to his fingers to the paper, his foot tapping all the while. _Yeah, that's nice,_ he thought. Miles and miles above and beyond the hackneyed standards that he'd been playing lately. Sometime soon he'd snap, he'd beat someone with a fiddle, start singing dirty lyrics to _Ole Susanna _or something. But it paid the bills, this minstrel show stuff. Money in the bank for his own joint someday. Once he'd pulled himself together a bit, got settled. In Chicago, maybe, where he'd grown up and knew people. Or Philadelphia. New Orleans.

Someday. Today found him on a crowded sooty little train stopped at a little station in the podunk middle of nowhere, on the way to their next performance. Bowler'd lost track of where they were. London was behind them, Kiev was next week, and Amsterdam was a distant memory. Only one passenger got off the train here, the only one not affiliated with the show, a big-chinned white man about his age who'd been sitting in the seat in front of him. And who'd been acting like he was gonna get knifed or robbed or both the whole time. Kind of thing Bowler should've been _long _used to, learned to live with. But you never really did.

Bowler, square-jawed and broad and a favorite with the ladies, was a singer and songwriter. And he planned to make it big. For now he warmed up the crowds, sang songs, and tickled the occasional ivories in little joints, mostly dance halls and the odd bordello. Most recently was this jaunt with a huge minstrel show, traveling all around Europe for audiences who'd probably never even seen real black folks before. This was his first time out of the States.

Good timing, too. Not three days after Bowler and his fellow musicians had boarded ship to Europe, the whole damn city of Chicago had burned down. Lucky for him he didn't have much in the way of family or possessions to worry about. For Bowler, life was the business, his true love was music, and his musician friends were his family.

Just went to show how much he liked these pals of his. If his three best friends hadn't also been involved with this show, there was no way Bowler would've joined up. Minstrel shows were boring and dated, the music uninspired, and were going the way of the dodo. Given how talented and fresh his buddies were, Bowler was surprised they were willing to do this, no matter the pay. It all offended Bowler, truth be told. Play the banjo, stick to what people _think _you're all about, keep yourself down and right where they want you. Stuck in the past. The future had a whole new meaning and a whole new sound, and that sound was represented by pencil scratches on newsprint.

"Got a great new song," Bowler said, tipping back his hat as he turned to Zed, who was sitting beside him reading the bit of the newspaper Bowler hadn't nicked. Zed was short, stocky, and played a mean bass for a kid barely twenty-three. Bowler'd met him back home in Chicago, when they'd both been playing dance halls.

"You've always got a great new song," Zed replied, unimpressed. "Quit scribblin' on my newspaper, will you? Know how long it took me to find one that wasn't in foreign?"

"'Bout ten seconds," said Blood'n'Guts Murphy from across the aisle. Murphy was light-skinned with enormous hands and feet. Tall like nothing Bowler'd ever seen, and one of the best horn players Bowler had ever met. They'd first heard each other when they were doing olio spots for a melodrama right after the War. "That white guy who was sittin' in front of you left it when he got off."

"I was being rhetorical," said Zed, rolling his eyes. The youngest of them, Zed was also the touchiest. So the other men liked to give him a hard time.

"Ooh, fancy," said Blind Elzy from his seat next to Blood'n'Guts. Old Elzy was from Mississippi, a real nice guy, had a nice wife and some nice kids. Real good for them they'd made it North. Bowler had no idea if Elzy was actually blind or not behind those dark glasses he always wore. It was just part of his persona, right along with his kitten-on-the-keys style on the piano. "The boy's smart, ain't he? Forget the bass, we should send him to Wilberforce."

Everyone except Zed laughed. Bowler gave the kid a punch in the arm. With another chuckle he ripped off the bit of the newspaper he'd scribbled on, folded it and tucked it into his pocket, ignoring Zed's horrified protests.

"Here, I left this clean," Bowler said, handing over the rest of the paper. "Would you just look at that, society page for my fancy friend. Eligible ladies. Pick one and marry up, you could really make something of yourself. Hey, just look at her, ain't she a doll?"

He pointed to a photograph of a white girl about Zed's age. Even Blood'n'Guts leaned over to look. The picture was grainy, but it would've had to have been a lot worse to make the girl unattractive. She had big eyes, a full mouth, and a beautiful head of hair. Probably the prettiest girl for miles around. There was a round of approving nods.

"Nice, but not as pretty as my girl back home," Zed said as he took the page, tucked it back into the paper, and went back to his reading. Over his head Bowler and Blood'n'Guts shared an eyeroll. Though it was true, Zed's little sweetheart _was _pretty, and real sweet. Bowler knew very well, had in fact given her the time once or twice before she'd fallen for Zed. Not that the kid _knew _that. Bowler sure wasn't telling.

"He's a good, loyal boy, that one," Elzy remarked paternally. "Going places." Zed didn't reply, but he looked pleased.

A whistle sounded, and with a clatter and a jolt the train began to move, pulling away from the tiny station platform.

"We're _all _going places, Elzy," Bowler said, tipping his trademark hat. "Someday we four are gonna make it big. Get outta this minstrel show, get our own place...a club, maybe. A real one, not just a saloon. It'll be something, you wait."

"Yeah, we'll be waiting all right," Blood'n'Guts said, folding his long spidery hands in his lap. "Til doomsday. They let us play the music, they don't let us own the joints. Maybe in the next life, Billy."

Blood'n'Guts always was the cynical type. Got on Bowler's nerves a bit.

As the train picked up speed it got too noisy to talk, so Bowler leaned back and tipped his hat over his face. Relaxing, he let the tune he'd been dreaming up fill his mind, flowing into his whole self. _Yeah, nice_, he thought again. It was gonna be big, his music. Take that spanking new ragtime to a whole different place. Blind Elzy's muggy bone-deep old-time sound, fresh from the Delta...throw in Blood'n'Guts swinging _let the bon temps rollay _bayou flavor...Zed's thrumming Chicago soul...and his own charismatic growling voice, cultivated with plenty of whiskey and cigarillos. A whole new style for a whole new world.

Yeah. They'd make it one day, Bowler Morton and His...Somethin' Boys. Still working on the name.

Just then the train car gave an almighty heave to one side. Before he knew what was going on Bowler was thrown heavily to one side and hit the window, knocking his hat off and rattling his brains. He got another rattle when Zed crashed into him. Dazed, he straightened up as much as he could and held onto his bowler, feeling a trickle of wet warm blood running down his forehead into his eye. Damn, that'd hurt.

"What's going on?" he cried, trying to push Zed off of him. His question was lost in the hubbub. The entire car was panicking, everyone yelling and making a mad rush to the front of the jerking car. Wiping the blood out of his eye and trying to ignore the crying and the screaming and the praying and the way it felt as though his head was going to explode, he looked across the way for Murphy and Elzy.

No sign. Maybe they'd made it out some way, without getting trampled or smothered. One of the drummers had been stomped on a little ways up the aisle. Bowler looked away. He righted his hat and closed his eyes, one arm around a pale and shaking Zed. The car continued to rattle and wobble, making a truly hellacious racket.

But Bowler Morton was concentrating on the music. When the train jumped the track for good, when the whole car went tumbling down an incline, as he was flung from his seat and into the luggage rack, he was thinking of the music.

0—0

Next thing he knew he was walking down a little street, and for a second he thought he was in Bohemia again, where they'd done their second show of the tour. A pretty little village, this one looked a lot like it. On second glance, though, this one was a little...off. Crooked. Dark, like the whole sky had gone black. What light was there was weird and green and seemed to glow. There were open coffins propped up against the walls everywhere he looked. Weird, but then you never knew with these Europe types. Bowler might've gone on thinking he was just somewhere foreign if he hadn't caught a glimpse of himself in a window. The sight brought him up short.

He was a skeleton.

_Damn,_ he thought, taking in his reflection. Only one of his eyes remained, but it didn't seem necessary for sight anymore. He could see just fine. Could see how he wasn't quite down to all skeleton yet. Skin was still stretched over his skeleton frame, but only barely. Could hardly be called skin at all anymore. He'd burned up all crispy and black, like one of his first wife's forgotten roasts.

"Boiler must've gone. Ain't no way I survived that," he said, taking another look at his sad, sorry, charred self. At least he still had his hat. What a miracle.

Dead. Bowler Morton. Dead. And what a way to go. Instead of being angry he found himself grateful he didn't recall anything about getting roasted. As there didn't seem to be too much else to do, he kept walking.

Eventually he came to the little square, just like the ones he'd seen all during the tour in little towns. There were cobblestones and a statue and some folks milling around over by a little shop. Only all inside out and different. And the folks—the other dead folks, he had no trouble understanding—they were all blue.

_Not much trouble over what color you are down here_, he thought, nodding and tipping his bowler as two dead ladies walked by, nodding at him politely. Charred bits of his skin flaked off and dropped to the ground as he did so, but the ladies didn't mention it, just smiled and moved on. This wasn't much like any of the spirit worlds he'd heard of, not the fire and brimstone his old man had always talked about, and bearing little resemblance to the heaven Elzy rhapsodized on when he was drunk.

But Billy "Bowler" Morton was dead as dust. He knew it. And wasn't quite sure why he didn't really mind.

"Billy," came Zed's voice from beside him, "I don't think we survived that crash."

Bowler turned, intending to ask his smart young friend what on God's green earth gave him that outlandish idea. When he did, he saw that Zed was a lot shorter than usual. A second look revealed that only Zed's top half was there. It looked like Zed was sprouting up out of the square, a weird little monument to train accident victims.

"Damn, son," Bowler exclaimed, tilting his hat back and eyeing his friend there on the ground. "Where's the rest of you?" Zed jerked a thumb.

"On your other side," he replied. Bowler turned, and yes indeed, there stood Zed's legs and lower torso. Thank the Lord he had no need for his insides any longer, as most of them seemed to have disappeared.

"You think Elzy and Murphy made it?" Bowler asked as he hoisted Zed back together. A little wobbly, sure, but it'd do.

"Made it where?" asked Blood'n'Guts, who had appeared at the other side of the square and was coming toward them. He looked Bowler up and down, then Zed, and then gave himself the once-over, taking in the godawful gouge of a wound eaten into his side. "Oh, damn. You're kidding."

"It appears we've gone to that undiscovered country, boys," put in Blind Elzy from behind them. "Ain't half-bad, from what I've seen. I'll miss the kids and the old lady, though..."

Everyone turned to look. Elzy, vibrantly blue but otherwise looking not too banged up, was standing just inside a crooked little doorway across the square. Bowler noticed a simple sign hanging over the door. It looked like a tombstone and had a crude picture of a wine bottle with a skull-and-crossbones label painted on. Death had really improved Bowler's eyesight, and he could make out _"Ball and Socket Pub" _on the sign, in that old-timey writing everyone seemed to like so much in foreign parts. Could do with an update or two, move with the times a bit.

"I think my old ticker went the second we started to wobble," Elzy went on, adjusting his dark glasses as he leaned against the doorframe. "Don't remember anything past then. Next thing I knew I was in this little place—looks like New Orleans, a bit, don't it, Murphy?And praise Jesus, I can see again. It's a miracle!"

"You're not funny, Elzy," grumped Zed, wobbling around as he tried to keep his halves together.

"Settle down, kid," said Blood'n'Guts mildly. He and Bowler glanced at each other over Zed's head. The kid would probably have a bit of trouble making peace with this whole deal. Again, Bowler wondered why he wasn't troubled. Felt like just another place to be, another gig to play, nothing more profound than that. Bowler Morton had been in plenty of places, and had played plenty of gigs. And he'd long since stopped being bothered about much of anything.

An old hymn his mother had always liked ran through his mind just then, and Bowler grinned to himself, bits of lip crumbling and falling off in ashes as he did so. _Where's your sting, Death? Still waitin' on it, _he thought.

"Come on over here and see this little joint," Elzy called to them, waving them over. Bowler tipped his hat, picked up Zed's top half, and made his way over to the doorway with Blood'n'Guts behind him and Zed's legs bringing up the rear.

"Nice, huh?" said Elzy, leading them inside. "And the landlady's a peach, real friendly. Least I think she's the landlady, might be a cook...Here, let's get us a drink."

It was a little saloon. A club. Lights, bar, stage, pool table, piano, everything. Colors like he hadn't seen in all his life, not even at the gaudiest music halls. And yet, there wasn't a band. That same deep part of him that knew he was dead somehow knew that, too. This place needed some _sound_. For a stupid second, Bowler wondered if maybe this was heaven after all. His own joint, set right there like it'd been waiting for him.

"New arrivals!" came a cry from near the bar. Somebody was ringing a dinner bell for all they were worth. More colored lights were lit. Every corpse in the place turned to the fresh group by the doorway and cheered, hoisting their glasses. There was a sense of camaraderie here that you only got with folks who'd been through something big, all the same and all together. All equals.

All that was missing was the music.

Billy "Bowler" Morton, who would have to think of a new stage name to suit his new hip joint, turned to his band-mates. His very self might've gone up in flames, but he still had that whole new sound thrumming through his skull. A whole new sound for a whole different world.

"Well, boys," he said with a skeleton grin and a tip of his charred bowler hat, "Looks like we might've found a new gig. Long-term. And I've got a great new song."


	2. Skeleton Boy and Skeleton Girl

**Skeleton Boy and Skeleton Girl**

"Come on, Evelyn, you cowardy-custard!" Adam called from the river's edge. "Come help me launch the ship!"

"I'm not a cowardy-custard," Evelyn replied in a small, hurt voice. She clutched her doll a bit closer and looked down at him from her perch on a flat rock embedded in the riverbank.

Evelyn didn't like playing so near the river. The rushing current made her nervous, as did the shadowy places under the bridge. But her brother, obsessed with boats and seafaring thanks to their retired sailor father, loved it. And as she was one year and three months older than her brother, it was her job to mind him. Particularly now, in springtime, when the usually calm little river was swollen with the melted ice and snow. Their father always told them to take extra care around the river in the springtime.

"Be careful," she warned her brother, Father's warnings in her head, but he paid her no heed as he sloshed barefoot along the river's edge, looking for the best spot to set down his toy boat. Annoyed, Evelyn shook her head. Adam was unmanageable sometimes, he truly was. But he was enjoying himself, and in the fresh air. Evelyn appreciated the fresh air herself. Sometimes, especially in spring, it could be very stuffy inside the village walls.

The sound of an approaching carriage made her look up. An ornate carriage pulled by a pair of horses was crossing the little stone bridge, heading toward the village gates. Evelyn watched the horses, handsome brown ones, and then the massive wheels of the carriage. The little curtains were pulled over the carriage windows, but the Everglot crest was plain on the door. For the moment Evelyn was distracted from worrying about her brother and the river.

Evelyn was fascinated by the Everglots. Their title, their ancestry, their enormous mansion, the dresses Lady Everglot wore and the parties that they threw. Often Evelyn would hang back in the square when on errands with her mother, and just stare at that imposing front door, wondering about the life that went on behind it. She always imagined jewels and fancy hats, lovely dresses and servants in livery.

Her mother said that the stork was due at the Everglots' soon. The entire village was talking about it. Most of the villagers, Evelyn's mother and father included, were certain the stork would bring a boy to be the next Lord Everglot. But Evelyn disagreed. Secretly, she hoped that Lord and Lady Everglot would have a daughter, and perhaps she and Evelyn could be friends someday. Little Miss Everglot would be much younger, of course, but that was all right. They could teach other things.

When the carriage disappeared through the gates, Evelyn turned her attention back to her doll. Soon enough she was lost in a daydream as she arranged the doll's hair and dress, imagining flounces and curls and preparing for a costume ball at the Everglots'...

"No!" Adam suddenly wailed from down the bank. Evelyn looked up, panicked by his tone, to see that his sailboat had been caught up in the current and was making its swift way downstream. She panicked even more when Adam began to wade into the river.

"Adam, don't! Stop!" she cried, tossing her doll aside and sliding down the bank. "You can't swim!"

"I want my boat!" he told her, and took another step, water rushing up along his knees and then up to his waist. The boat spun and tipped in the frothy water, seemingly a hundred miles away downriver. There was no way they would catch it, not now.

"Adam, come back here this instant!" Evelyn shouted, trying to catch up with him. She lost her footing on a slippery rock, and stumbled into the icy water. Chilled and dripping in knee-high water, she watched as her brother took another step away from her.

And, just like that, he was gone. Sucked under the surface without a trace. Too shocked and frightened even to scream, Evelyn gasped and pressed both hands to her mouth. For a moment she stood, frozen, the water tugging at her. She could cry for help, but no one would hear her. The town crier, usually on hand whenever anything out of the ordinary happened, as if by magic, was nowhere to be seen. There was no one to help. She couldn't waste any more time.

Evelyn made her choice, and dove into the rushing water after her brother.

0—0

Soaking wet and cold but otherwise unharmed, Evelyn and Adam walked hand in hand along the narrow street that led to their house. Mother would be furious. They'd ruined their clothes, lost their toys, _and _it was dark. Evelyn, older and supposed to be her brother's keeper, would be in especial trouble.

"I'm sorry," Adam said eventually, snuffling a bit. It was as though he'd read her mind. "Evvie? I said I'm sorry. That I lost the boat and fell in the water."

Evelyn ignored him. She wasn't speaking to him at the moment. She just tugged him along, wondering why there were strings of lights strung between windows. And why the lamplight coming from a few of the windows along the street was green. And why the cobblestone lane seemed so awfully long. She decided it was probably just because she was tired from all the excitement, and the exertion of splashing about in the cold water. Her eyes were playing tricks.

But when the two of them reached the end of their lane, Evelyn knew something was wrong. She let go of her brother's hand and took a few cautious steps forward, glancing around all the while. Something was very wrong indeed.

"Where is our house?" Adam asked, again seeming to read her mind.

Evelyn did not reply, but this time it was because she was frightened and confused. At the end of the twisty little lane there should be a little house. With a basket on one side of the door, and a little pot of flowers on the top step. There should be a lamp in the narrow front window.

None of that was here. There was just a wall. A dead end. At the same time, the two of them turned to look at each other. And as one, they gasped.

"Adam, you...you're _blue_!" Evelyn cried.

"So are you!" Adam cried in return.

After that, there didn't seem to be much to say. Deeply worried and deeply scared, Evelyn held out her blue hand. Adam, frowning and looking near tears, took it in his own. With nothing else to do, they turned and walked back the way they had come.

Now that she was aware that something was different, was wrong, _everything _seemed different and wrong about the village. Everywhere there were crooked walls and twisted bits of iron. There were stairs in places that didn't make sense. The buildings were not in orderly rows like they should be. Feeling a very deep dread, Evelyn stepped a bit closer to her brother and held his hand more tightly as they walked.

_What shall we do?_ Evelyn fretted. _Whatever shall we do...?_

Eventually they came to the square. At least that was the same as at home—all roads in the village led to the town square. To people. To adults who could, perhaps, tell them what was happening. Who could fix things and make them right again. Helpless, Evelyn and Adam stopped next to the statue in the center of the square, wondering what to do next.

"Look, it's a skellington horse," Adam remarked, pointing up at the statue. Evelyn looked up and saw that he was right. A skeleton horse. A dead horse.

"And look, there are more," he added, pointing again, this time at the front steps of a building across the way. "But they're people skellingtons. Skellingtons in clothes."

"_Skeletons_," Evelyn corrected. When she looked over, she saw that the skeletons standing on the steps, one in trousers and one in a tattered dress, were looking back at her. The one in trousers gave a little wave, which Adam returned.

"Adam," she said slowly, beginning to edge away from the statue and pulling him along with her, "We're in a town of dead people."

"You're right, little girl," came a man's voice, kind and deep, from behind her. Turning, Evelyn saw the skeleton who had waved to them. Next to it (him?) stood the skeleton in the dress. "And you both are dead people, too, now."

"Now really, Harry, you could have been a bit more gentle than that!" said the lady skeleton, and she gave him a little swat with a moth-eaten handbag. Looking down at Evelyn and Adam she added in a sweeter tone, "You must excuse him, he can be terribly blunt. But he _is _correct, dear. I'm afraid you both are...well, _downstairs_ now."

For a moment Evelyn felt a wave of dread and sadness so keen that she was sure she would explode with the force of it. Somewhere deep down, some little traitor part of her knew that the skeletons were right. She and Adam were not alive any longer. It was all so clear, so obvious, now that she let herself consider it. No more heartbeat, no more rumbling stomach, no more breathing in and out, no more being able to feel the wet dress she had on that even now dripped on the cobblestones.

But still Evelyn shook her head. "No," she said firmly, fighting back the sadness. "I am not dead, I am seven."

"Being dead is for old people," Adam agreed, sounding very sure. "Not for children."

Even though the skeletons didn't have faces, it was clear that the look they exchanged was a pitying one. After a pause the man skeleton crouched down so that he was at socket level with them.

"That's very true," he said simply. "Say, though, as you're here...would you like to have something to drink? Or listen to a spot of music, perhaps?"

Unsure, though not feeling scared or threatened, Evelyn did not reply. Going somewhere with skeletons she'd only just met, and bringing her little brother along, was not something a responsible older sister would do. Mother and Father wouldn't approve, not at all.

_Mother and Father aren't here, _Evelyn told herself, still trying to get used to the idea. _We won't see them again..._

"There's a place here with a lovely piano," added the woman skeleton. She spoke quickly, as though sensing what Evelyn was thinking about. "It's just over there. The Ball and Socket Pub, it's called. A very nice French man's head operates it. I'm quite sure he won't mind if we bring in our newest arrivals."

Adam, his expression hopeful, looked at Evelyn. Adam did so love to listen to music, just the same as she did. Perhaps that was just what she needed, what they both needed, to help them feel a little better. To help them get used to things. This new place.

"Yes, thank you," she said, trying to smile. The man skeleton stood and held out his bony hand. Evelyn, after only a moment's hesitation, took it. The woman skeleton did the same for Adam. Linked thus in a row, the four of them made their way across the square.

As they strolled, taking their time, the grown-up skeletons chatted over the childrens' heads about nothing much in particular. Every once in a while they would ask Evelyn and Adam a question—their names, of course, and what games they liked, those questions that grown-ups always asked children. Evelyn let Adam answer, for the most part. She didn't feel much like talking, not even to very kind skeletons like these.

She was seven. She wasn't supposed to be dead. But at least she had her brother. And Adam had her. Always.

Evelyn squeezed Adam's little blue hand tightly, reassuringly. They shared a brave little smile as the skeleton couple guided them both into the bright, colorful, welcoming little pub.


	3. Elder Gutknecht

**Elder Gutknecht**

In winter the dark came on early, and deepened quickly. A recent storm, the first of the season, had left a blanket of snow deep enough to nearly cover the headstones in the churchyard.

A pair of lit candles sat on the small table, and a tiny fire crackled in the grate. Pastor Gutknecht huddled down in his chair, a well-worn book on his lap. Most of his time was passed in this fashion of late. In his little cell in his little stone church, with only the fire, the view of the graveyard, and his volumes of ancient lore and religious history to keep him company.

For the past few days he'd been turning again and again to the little leather Bible that his mother had given him nearly a century before, when he had left his home village for this one. And again and again he would turn the brittle pages to Ecclesiastes. Always that, lately. It gave him comfort. And hope. _For him who is joined to all the living, there is hope..._

Not that Pastor Gutknecht had felt all that joined to his fellow man for the past year or so. Age had withered him, slowed him more than he liked. The pastor had had the pleasure and responsibility of caring for the people of this little village for nearly eighty years. He had christened them, married them, buried them, counseled them in times of need, celebrated with them in times of joy, married more and then christened more.

Every week he had delivered sermons, messages of, he hoped, wisdom and compassion. Though each Sunday the pews were full, Pastor Gutknecht remained uncertain about whether his villagers came for the sake of God or for the sake of fellowship. Or even, perhaps, for his sake. Not that it truly mattered, he supposed, so long as they heard the Word, were good to one another, and were able to lead joyful lives. Gutknecht missed giving sermons most of all. He had not had the strength to do so for many weeks.

Dearly he hoped his villagers did not think he had forgotten them. He ached to see them all. To ask after their lives, see the new children, hear their problems and to help them. To guide them, as a pastor should. But he was simply unable. It was all he could do to sit through young Pastor Galswells' sermons each week, and not only because of the content. For the past few Sundays he had not attended, much to his shame. He had been much too weak and tired. Instead he had been here, in his chair in his dim cell, reading and reflecting and praying. Losing himself in his mind, in his spirit, trying to forget the flesh and all that went with it.

_Vanity of vanities...One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh, but the earth abideth for ever..._

A flutter at the window pulled his attention. Gutknecht looked up, squinted, and smiled. A raven sat on the sill, peering in at him.

Coughing and ignoring the pain it brought, Gutknecht stood with difficulty. Aided by his gnarled walking stick, he made his slow, stooped way to the window, which he unlatched and pushed open. With a flirt and a flutter in the raven stepped, shaking snow from his wings.

"Mordechai," said Gutknecht, shutting the window behind the bird. "Wonderful to see you, my friend."

The raven croaked and gently nipped one of Gutknecht's gnarled fingers in greeting, then fluttered his way to his usual perch on the back of the chair. Gutknecht wished he had a little something for the bird, some scrap left from the last meal that Galswells' wife had brought for him earlier in the day. Ever since he was a young man he'd kept birds. Ravens were plentiful in this village, and Gutknecht had kept several special ones over the years. Intelligent, they were, if misunderstood. Many disliked them due to their association with death, but that association never bothered Gutknecht.

Exhausted by even the short walk across the room, he settled into his chair again. He breathed deeply, slowly, closing his eyes and listening to his heart beat. For over ninety years it had been going, on and on. But it was slower lately.

"It is good to have company," Gutknecht remarked to Mordechai, who was preening his feathers and croaking to himself on the back of the chair. "'Two are better than one, for if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow. Woe to him that is alone when he falleth.' But I've told you that before, surely."

Mordechai made a little sound, one that Gutknecht always considered a chirp. So far as ravens could chirp. With another soul in the room, the evening seemed brighter, warmer. Gutknecht opened his Bible to where he'd left off, words he knew so well he hardly had need to read them: _Man hath no better thing under the sun, than to eat, and to drink, and to be merry: for that shall abide with him of his labour the days of his life..._

A knock at the door roused him from a doze he hadn't been aware he'd slipped into. With a caw Mordechai hopped onto the armrest, and Gutknecht lifted a finger to reassuringly stroke his head. After Gutknecht called a greeting, the door opened to reveal young Pastor Galswells.

He was tall and angular with a deep thundering voice. Though he could not have been much older than twenty-five, Galswells carried himself with the pomp and authority of age. This evening visit was a ritual Gutknecht looked forward to—Galswells would tell him of the village, of the care of the church, of the plans for services. Gutknecht would have been lost, unmoored, without this link to the world that he loved and missed. Tonight, as ever, he listened eagerly to all of the news.

"The Van Dorts have had a son," Galswells informed him at length. Gutknecht smiled. Children were always good news.

"The fish merchants, yes? What have they called him?"

"The official christening is tomorrow," replied Galswells. "But I believe they have decided upon William."

Gutknecht nodded approvingly. The Van Dorts were good people, an old family in the village. In fact, he had known the first William Van Dort, a fisherman who had been elderly when Gutknecht had first come to the village. Mr. Van Dort's funeral had been the first service Gutknecht had ever conducted. And now his namesake's christening might be the last.

"I think I should like to conduct the christening," Gutknecht said after some reflection. Galswells sighed, fixing him with a look of tired patience. Gutknecht added, "It's been so very long since there has been a new child in the village. Not since your son was born, my boy...three years ago?"

Galswells did not reply, but continued to regard Gutknecht with that quietly exasperated expression. While it was true that Gutknecht would dearly love to hold a child again, to say a prayer for him, there was more to his desire than that. In truth, he did not want Galswells' particular brand of godliness to be the first the infant encountered. Over the past weeks, when Galswells had delivered the sermons, he had noticed the themes. Fear, punishment, judgment, sin and retribution. Hopelessness.

Oh, Gutknecht himself had gone through his own Puritanical phase, fresh from Wittgenstein and knowing all about scripture but nothing of human experience. Yet somehow Gutknecht was sure that the young Pastor Galswells was not merely going through a phase. He would always treat the villagers like wayward children. Doomed and wicked ones.

"Your honor, you are hardly strong enough to conduct a service," Galswells told him, speaking as one would to a child.

"I married the Wadleighs this past autumn," replied Gutknecht, stroking his long white beard and twirling it round his fingers. He remembered clearly, so pleased had he been to be of service again regardless of the circumstances. The pair of them, Alfred and Gertrude, standing before him in his cell in the very early morning, mist still rising over the gravestones in the churchyard. Mordechai perched atop the bookcase, he and young Master Wadleigh's coachman the only witnesses. They had looked so young, so very happy. So clearly in love with one another.

"You helped them elope," corrected Galswells, an edge to his tone. "That is not the same thing."

The gall of this young man. Pastor Gutknecht had no great love for being treated as though he were a schoolboy caught stealing apples. While it was true, he had married the pair of them in secret, and both families were still angry with him because of it. Or so he heard. Gertrude Elvstead, a girl he had christened and watched grow up, had come to him in the middle of the night, had explained her situation and had pleaded for counsel regarding her unfortunate and all too common situation. And Gutknecht had given it.

"We have so little time," Gutknecht finally said, his voice low as he repeated, more or less, just what he'd said to Miss Gertrude. "Our portion is small, and it is full already of trial. Why spend our lives desperately unhappy? What is the purpose?"

"The purpose," Galswells said, his deep voice rumbling, "is duty. Responsibility and moral duty. Upholding the social order and keeping our community together. Those are what we must do for our flock as well, your honor, just as much as anything else."

"Moral duty," repeated Gutknecht, remembering the look on young Miss Elvstead's face when she'd come to him, pleading for his help.

Galswells continued as though Gutknecht had not spoken. "We do not deserve happiness, we poor sinners. We must strive to live correctly, righteously, so that we may enjoy everlasting life. Rewards in heaven."

"Why not enjoy the life we're certain of, Pastor Galswells, rather than counting on the unknown?"

The question gave the younger man pause. "Your honor," he said slowly. "That sounds quite close to blasphemy."

Gutknecht was silent.

"You sound quite unconcerned for—and forgive me, your honor—a man who might soon meet his Maker," said Galswells, looking at him closely.

"I am not altogether concerned," admitted Gutknecht, exhausted and ready to be shut of this conversation. "And perhaps there is no Maker to meet."

Galswells' stunned silence seemed to fill the room. Gutknecht closed his eyes, held a cold hand up to his face. He was tired, that was all. Not thinking. He had not meant to say that aloud. The silence stretched, deepened, the only sound the crackling of the fire and Mordechai's occasional chirp.

_Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. _When had he ceased to be afraid?

Not long after that, Galswells left. The fire in the cell had burned all the way down, the candles nearly out. Gutknecht, feeling his exhaustion deep in his bones, closed his eyes and bowed his head, praying for understanding.

0—0

Something profound had happened.

Instead of yellow candlelight, there was silvery moonshine. Though after a moment he realized the moon was nowhere to be seen. And he felt a lightness, an ease which he hadn't known in decades. No weight on his shoulders. He was nowhere, but he was also everywhere.

Gutknecht took a breath that wasn't really a breath at all. Again he felt that weightlessness, a pull, the silvery light all around him and all within him.

Somehow he knew that he could keep going. If he were to let go, if he were to let out one more airless breath, he could go farther. Release. Freedom. After nearly a century in flesh, he could be pure spirit.

The light. We come from the light, we go back to the light. And that was all. Perhaps there was no Maker but this, no Judgment but one's own.

But then, something strange. Once more his thoughts took coherent form. Faces of his friends and neighbors, his flock, those who had depended on him, became clear as day and mixed with the moonshine. A deep, vital part of him longed for the light, for the heightened oblivion, but something held him back. Those faces.

Even in death, they were with him. He'd helped so many on their way here. There would always be more to follow. Gutknecht could not bear to leave them completely. Something still felt unfinished.

When he opened his eyes again, he was aware that he was truly opening his eyes. He had form. And so did this place. It was a square, much like the one he had left behind. There was no one about, but he could feel presences everywhere, other souls. The silvery light was gone, but that feeling of being pure, of being insubstantial and yet complete, remained. Gutknecht knew he would never forget that feeling, no matter how long he chose to remain here.

_All go unto one place. All are of the dust, and all turn to dust again._

But he was not dust. Not yet. And so he began to walk.

Gutknecht had read of cities of the dead in folklore. This, though, seemed a village of the dead, one very like the one he had left. The narrow streets, the lopsided houses, the brick and stone. Similar enough to offer a measure of comfort to the recently departed, it seemed, but different. Oh, it was very different.

Earth instead of sky. Coffins propped open in alleyways. Green light in the windows. So many colors, he'd never seen the like, not even on the most vibrant summer flowers. The longer he strolled, the more calm he became. The more certain that his choice had been the right one. That core of his being, the same one that was part of the light and longed for the light, told him so.

Perhaps it was that inner light that led him to a rickety old tower near the edge of the city of the dead. At the top of a set of stairs there was a garret.

"It cannot be hell," he mused, looking around. "There are far too many books."

Gutknecht walked along the shelves, observed the piles upon piles of books upon the floor. Someone had been here, and recently. From the exposed rafters came familiar flutters and croaks. Ravens. Of course. Again Gutknecht was sure the birds were another sign that he had done what was right, and that there was no punishment forthcoming. Up a narrow flight of stairs he went, painlessly, and without becoming winded or dizzy. He was beyond that now. Upon the desk there was an open volume, as though it had been waiting for him.

A Bible, thick and old and tattered. Open to Ecclesiastes. As if the garret's previous occupant had left it for him to find. Gutknecht ran a finger—blue-gray now in hue, he noticed—over the brittle page.

"'For the living know that they shall die,'" he read aloud. A raven fluttered down from the rafters and perched on a nearby tower of books. "'But the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward, for the memory of them is forgotten.'"

The words, so familiar, took on quite a new meaning in his current circumstances. Gutknecht allowed himself a small smile, even going so far as to shake his head. He'd always enjoyed this particular passage. Eat, drink, be merry, live joyfully with wife and family, take joy in your little portion of life. It had always been comforting. Even more comforting to know that, for some, such earthly joys could continue after death.

"'For there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest,'" he finished from memory. He took a step back, took another look around the garret. Out of a little window he could see the dead in the streets that he had not seen earlier. Going about their afterlives with full knowledge that they were dead. Had they all come back from where he had? Or were they all waiting to go there?

Somehow Pastor Gutknecht thought it was the latter.

For though the Preacher had been very wise, he had also been alive. Gutknecht was here, in the grave, and saw that there still might be wisdom. Perhaps even hope. Hope that every soul could reach that place where he had been, the place that he had turned away from. Perhaps not heeding that call to the light was an unforgivable and ungodly act of ego. At the same time, he felt it was the right choice. He had dedicated his life to service, to being a shepherd to the people of his village. Why should death stop him?

There was eternal work for an Elder to do.


	4. Paul, The Head Waiter

**Paul, the Head Waiter**

Sacre bleu, the _cock__roaches_!

Paul raised a foot and brought it down hard, missing the skittering roach by inches. Huffing, he watched the bug run across the floor, up the wall, and into a tiny crack near the ceiling. _So bold! _Paul thought, twitching his trim little mustache.

"Mon Dieu, vermin _everywhere_," he muttered as he turned his attention back to creating swans out of linen napkins. "It will never do. No. _Non_."

While his annoyance was genuine—nobody wanted little bugs running about during a wedding reception, it spoiled the ambiance—he was not shocked. The little roaches were as much a fixture of the tavern as the beer barrels behind the bar, the broken shutters, and the slight rising smell in the smaller guest room upstairs. This place was at least as old as the village, a timber-frame tucked round the corner from the village square proper. There was a tiny sign, but it didn't need one—everyone knew what it was. The Tavern. Only one in the village. In all honesty The Tavern, which served the village as a pub, a restaurant, an inn and a hall, was a real _baraque_. A dump. And yet, it was Paul's _baraque_. Through work and talent he had made it his own.

"You just stay where you are put, boys, comprendrez-vous?" Paul called as he expertly folded the napkin, a swan quickly appearing under his skilled fingers. He hoped his little bug-boarders were listening. "In your teeny hidey-holes, oui? No more running about, not when we have a wedding party tomorrow! When the Van Dorts and their guests are gone, you may come out again. D'accord, boys? Deal?"

Even as he spoke he spotted movement out of the corner of his eye. A roach even bolder than the last was twitching its way up and down and around the bottles of wine that Paul had set out on the long serving table. As Paul watched it, the beastie slowed, then stopped, perched atop one of the bottles. It seemed to be looking at him. As if it could tell that he was watching it. After a moment the roach twitched its little feelers at him and skittered down again, off and away to a crack in the floorboards.

So very _cheeky_! All he could do was shrug, unable to keep from smiling a little. The little roaches had been here long before Paul had arrived and they would most likely be here long after he left.

At the thought of leaving, Paul paused mid-swan, staring at its featureless little head. From within the walls came the skittering of bugs, and from somewhere else came the sound of a slow, steady drip of something or other leaking.

He knew this place, as they say, like he knew the back of his face. Nearly fifteen years he had been here, and ah, memories. There were the marks on the door-frame where Lady Glottberg's enormous hoop skirt had become stuck. It had taken Paul and three other men to pry her loose. There above the wide front window was a hole in the plaster where one of the resident Generals had accidentally fired a round from his service pistol while re-enacting a war story—Paul had never figured out which one of them it had been. Both of the old men had claimed credit. There in the corner was the little table where the Captain Wadleigh and his wife always sat, their visits like clockwork every other Saturday evening.

Ah, but he should not let affection cloud his judgment. This he knew. He did not want to be in such a place forever. And the offer he had had, it was excellent. One he would be a fool to turn down. His cousin Auguste had written to him of a job opening at Le Petit Moulin Rouge. Maitre d'Hotel. Just what Paul had always wanted, just what he had been working for.

And yet...he would miss this place. Tiny bugs and all. Paul sniffed, wiped a little tear from the corner of his eye, and went back to his folding.

"I've finished the wedding cake!" came Madame's low, round-toned voice. Paul glanced up to see her standing in the doorway at the top of the stairs that led down to the kitchen. Her flushed face betrayed a morning of work, as did the apron dusted with flour and smeared with icing, and her sleeves pushed up past her sturdy forearms. She looked very pleased with herself.

"It's sublime," she added, joining him at the long table where he worked. "Wait until you see it!"

"I am sure it is merveilleux, Madame," Paul told her. Immediately Madame puffed up like a little ruffled hen.

"You can call me Agnes, you know. I've told you so a hundred times," she told him, her tone amiable. This was an old, friendly disagreement between them. Paul gave a dainty shrug.

"It is a mark of respect," he informed her kindly. "As I believe I have told you...ooh la la, at least _un million _times."

"You old saucebox," Madame said, swatting him playfully on the arm. Quickly Paul glanced down to make sure she hadn't got flour on his jacket. "At least call me Miss Plum. 'Madame' makes me sound ancient. I'm only thirty-six!"

By Paul's count she had been thirty-six for at least a decade by now, but he let it pass. He handed her a basket of fresh orange blossom and a vase, and she set about putting together an arrangement for the wedding party's table.

Companionably they worked side by side in silence. Ah, stout and comfortable Madame. They had begun work here at the tavern at the same time, the day they had both arrived in answer to an advertisement-she to cook, he to run the dining room. And once he'd convinced her he was prepared to love her only for her personality and her _magnifique _blintzes_,_ the pair of them had gotten on famously. He'd tried not to think too much about how he would miss having her about.

"How long will you be staying after the wedding?" Madame asked him now. She tried to sound nonchalant, but Paul caught the undertone of sadness. Looking down at her out of the corner of his eye, he saw that she was resolutely not looking at him.

Paul finished his last swan and set it to one side among its fellows. "Not too very long. I will make certainment Monsieur William and Mam'selle Nell are happily in the bridal suite, and then I shall go."

Professional that he was, the mention of the bridal suite made Paul run down the little checklist of preparations in his mind—nice sheets (easy, as there had been no guests nor live-ins since the Generals had died), a bottle of champagne (the genuine, which he kept locked up), a tasteful flower or two. Parfait. He would prepare it all after the dining room was finished.

A sniffle distracted him. Turning, he saw that Madame had begun to cry. Clearly she was trying to hold it in, but the sniffles and snorts were difficult to hide. As her hands were full of orange blossom the tears ran freely down her face.

"Oh la la," he clucked and soothed, "Ah non, Madame...The little flowers do not need watering. These little swans do not need a pool."

Paul tittered and nudged her with an elbow, but she did not smile. Frowning in sympathy, he handed her his handkerchief, which she took wordlessly.

"Ah, Madame," he said, watching her mop her face. "I am sad also. It is hard to leave here, it has been my home. Mais...c'est la vie, oui? Meetings, partings. I shall write. And you must visit! You and Boris both must come to France to see me."

"What'll we do without you?" Madame asked, shaking her head and blowing her nose. Paul waited for the noise to subside before he spoke.

"You shall get on fine," he assured her. "You will run the place well. I have full faith. You will all get on just like little ducklings, oui?"

"Just ducky, you mean," she replied, muffled by the handkerchief. But Paul grinned to hear the smile in her voice. "Won't be the same without you though, Paul. You've got that certain...I don't know what."

"Je ne sais quoi," Paul supplied.

"Yeah, that."

Their nice tete-a-tete, perhaps the last they would ever have, was interrupted just then by the unmistakable skitter of a cockroach. Yes, there it was, investigating the wedding table, hurrying this way and that and poking its little antennae against Paul's intricate cloth swans and freshly polished silver. With a flick of her wrist Madame snapped the handkerchief at the roach, but it evaded her handily. Together they watched it scuttle across the dining room and disappear into a hole along the base of the bar.

"Oh, I do get tired of them little things," she said. "We really should get rid of'em. It's not fitting to have bugs where people eat."

"Borax," Paul told her. He gently took the handkerchief from her and paused, thinking better of putting it in his vest pocket again. He stuffed it into his jacket pocket instead. "We used it at the inn at Lyon. Mix with sugar, scatter on the floor, et voila. Dead little roaches."

"Eh, I'll tell Boris," Madame said. She set the orange blossoms and vase to one side and brushed off her hands. "I'll go put the cake in the cool room. I'll see you at tea."

"A bientot, oui," he replied. After she had disappeared back down the stairs to the kitchen, Paul finished the arrangement of orange blossoms with quick, assured fingers. Simple and elegant. It would do. And so on to his next task, the bridal suite.

In a little nook near the top of the stairs was a tiny door which hid the dumbwaiter shaft. The dumbwaiter had been one of Paul's first improvements at the tavern. It was not mechanized, of course, they were too poor for that. Pulleys and weights did the job just as well. And the shaft was a wonderful means of communication between floors.

Paul opened the little door and stuck his head into the dimness, looking down into the shadows. The dumbwaiter itself must be one floor up. A quick upward glance confirmed his suspicion. He whistled, short and shrill.

"Boris!" he called, his voice echoing a little. "Boris! Attendez!"

There was a clank and a clatter, and then Boris's round, bald head appeared below, thrown into shadow by the dark dumbwaiter shaft. Tilting his face up, he regarded Paul with large, slowly blinking eyes.

"Yes, sir?" asked Boris. Cooking smells wafted up the shaft from the kitchen. Ooh la la, lamb. He might not be bright or quick, but none could beat Boris for butchering or for roasts. He had a gift. Most likely not even the Moulin Rouge could boast such talent in the kitchen.

"Please, tell Madame to send me up the good sheets, for the bridal suite," Paul said. "Bring the dumbwaiter down and send it back up, I will meet it upstairs, oui?"

"Yes, sir."

"And some of that lamb for me, if it is ready," Paul called with a laugh. "It smells _magnifique_!"

"Yes, sir," Boris said, pleased, and Paul watched his head disappear. Paul took another sniff. That lamb truly did have an intoxicating aroma. Paul's mouth watered a bit. He had not eaten a thing all day, so busy he had been.

From above came a rattle. Paul cocked an eyebrow and twisted his head to the side, glancing upward. The rattle grew louder as the dumbwaiter descended. A split-second too late, he realized what was happening.

Paul didn't even have time to gasp before everything went black.

0—0

"New arrival! Tap another barrel!"

When Paul opened his eyes, he was in a dim room. He'd barely had a chance to take in his surroundings when a large purplish face thrust itself toward his own. Paul reeled back in surprise.

"Hey there, sir! Welcome! Here, what'll you have?" asked the face. As the face withdrew, Paul saw that it belonged to a man standing behind a bar. He wore a long apron and had a mustache that was truly _formidable_.

Disoriented and unused to being the one _asked _such questions, Paul only blinked. He glanced around and realized he was in a pub. Of sorts. But it was not his tavern. Something seemed wrong. Something he could not quite put all his fingers on...That was when he glanced down. Glanced down, gasped, and then screamed. And then he screamed again.

Paul had no body. He stopped at his collar, which was resting atop the bar. He was a _tete_ with nothing beneath. His body was gone! _Gone!_ Such things did not _happen_!

"_Ou est mon corps?!_" he cried, glancing around desperately, nearly tipping himself over. "My head! Oh ma poor _tete_! Where is the rest _du moi_?!"

"Oi, now! Oi!" said the barman loudly, speaking over Paul's frantic confused Franglais and pushing a pint glass of something red and bubbling at him. "Calm down, sir. Here, drink this, you'll feel better."

Paul stopped short, and stared up at the man before spitting, "Drink? I have _no arms_! Quel est _wrong_ avec vous?"

But the barman simply held the glass up to Paul's mouth for him. After a moment's consideration, Paul took a sip. Whatever it was, it _did _seem to calm him down. Even though he had no body. Just a head propped on a bar, thankful for his starched collar helping to keep him upright. Another sip. He did not bother wondering where the drink went, with no throat to carry it. In this regard his ignorance was his bliss.

"Better?" asked the barman. Paul could not nod without a neck, so he wiggled his eyebrows. The barman seemed to know what he meant, for he grinned.

The bar was filling with people. From his vantage point next to a keg Paul could see all down the bar and most of the rest of the room. It was small and dim, with earth walls. Like a crypt. Indeed, most of the people here he recognized as being no longer among the living. He had catered some of their funerals. A few nodded and said hello. _Tres gentil_ of them.

"I am...as you say...mort, oui? I have died?" Paul asked, knowing the answer. Only little roaches could go about with such important parts missing. Men were not so strong.

"'Fraid so," said the barman, filling another pint glass and handing it to another customer over Paul's head. "Not so bad, though, once you get used to it. What happened to you, if I may ask?"

"I am not sure," Paul said slowly. He tried to think. And then he gasped. The dumbwaiter. _The dumbwaiter_.

Oh, that Boris. That _cretin_! That _imbecile_! If ever he saw him again...! Though really, Paul was aware that if and when he saw Boris again, Boris would be quite beyond anything that Paul could do to him.

"_Un accident_," he told the barman, "named Boris."

"Eh?" asked the barman, cocking an eyebrow.

"Rien," said Paul gloomily. The barman stepped away, leaving Paul to sigh and sit morosely next to his half-empty pint glass, watching a pair of cockroaches roaming along the bar, weaving their way unremarked between elbows and glasses. Some things never did change. He was rather comforted by the sight of the little bugs.

Paul realized that the roaches were scuttling their way over to him. When they were a few inches from him, they put out their tiny feelers and tested the air. Squinting and giving a sharp look at them, he saw that they looked a bit different than other roaches. Something about their color. And they seemed to sense that Paul was closely regarding them. They seemed to be watching _him. _One twitched a little closer, and made a little noise.

"Bonjour," Paul replied. For a moment the three of them simply regarded one another. Something about the calm, familiar way the cockroaches looked at him-and Paul knew that they were truly looking at him-made him ask, "Do I know you, boys?"

One of the roaches trundled closer until its feelers touched Paul's chin. Again came the little squeak. Ah, it was mad,_ fou..._but Paul could have sworn the teeny bug said, _Borax_.

"Oooh la la," Paul clucked, looking at the little beasties. They did look a little purplish around the feelers. "My poor little boys. I am sorry. It was my idea, the poison. I do hope you forgive me. We are all in one boat now, oui?"

The roaches tilted their feelers as though in agreement. Then, much to Paul's shock, they scurried over to him and wedged themselves under his stiff collar. Displaying amazing strength for small bugs, the two roaches hoisted Paul's head onto their backs.

"Sacre bleu!" he cried in alarm and confusion, as the roaches carried him along the bar. As they traveled, more roaches joined in the entourage, until Paul was being supported by at least a dozen cockroaches, some alive and some dead. Corpses all along the bar moved their glasses out of the way, laughing and applauding at the unexpected little show.

"Ah, merci, yes!" Paul exclaimed with a laugh when the roaches finally stopped at the end of the bar. Thank you, boys!" What unsinkable little bugs they were. Creatures to be admired.

Most of the roaches dispersed, leaving Paul hoping that they would be back again. His two little dead friends stayed with him, arranging themselves attractively on his collar. Roaches. A bar, with shelves behind—coffins, he noticed now. Even a piano, which also looked as though it had recently held a corpse. And the clientele...so much more _boisterous_, so much more _alive_! It was what he had thought Paris would be.

Paul sniffed and blinked. He'd never see Paris. There would be no Maitre d' position, there would be no Moulin Rouge. No writing to Madame. Partings, oui, as he'd said. He'd not thought they would be so permanent.

"C'est la vie," Paul murmured. Then he caught himself, and grinned a little. "Or c'est la mort, oui?"

He looked around again, twitching his mustache as he considered with a more professional eye. And his conclusion: _Quelle baraque! _What a hole! Not fit for piglets! A crypt that should be a mausoleum, a charnelhouse that should be an ossuary.

The idea was there, the promise. A tavern was the first place one should _always _go when in a strange new place. At the end of a long day's travel, people wanted a jovial atmosphere and a nice drink. To put up their feet, sigh, and relax. In style. And what, in the end, was death but a long, long rest after the day was done? And what was this Land of the Dead, but a strange new place?

A few ideas began to form in Paul's mind. He would have to ask the barman whether he might be in the market for a fully trained Maitre d'Hotel. With all his talents, he could make this little place shine!

"Par Dieu, I could be head waiter after all," Paul said to the roaches, who twitched and squeaked. Then, realizing what he said, he giggled.

Head waiter. _ Tres amusant_. He would have to remember that.


	5. The Cut-In-Half Man

**The Cut-In-Half Man  
**

Ah, the smell of freshly felled pine. That was like nothing else in the world.

Sir Robert Glottberg took a deep whiff, exhaled noisily, and grinned. Jolly good stuff. Legs braced and arms folded, he stood in the yard just outside the sawmill and surveyed his property. He never tired of looking at it. Ever since he'd struck it rich, rich enough to be awarded a baronetcy, Robert felt he spent more time in his little office and store in the village than he did with the mill he and his father had built with their own hands. It was a Glottberg family enterprise, though for some reason, Robert's younger brother Raymond didn't seem to love it as he did. He seemed content enough with keeping the books and working in the shop. Robert simply didn't understand it. How could one not see the beauty of this place?

Shavings and chips and dust were scattered everywhere. The river which wound its way through the woods and around the village was at its widest and most powerful here, about two miles downstream from the village itself. The roar it made was a vital and powerful sort of sound, at its peak flowing through the waterwheel into the little millpond. The dark forest stood all around, brimming with oak and birch and pine, all ready to be felled. From within the mill came the metallic whir and buzz of the gangsaw and the enormous new head saw. Robert took another deep breath.

Work had been progressing nicely with the birch stand near the village, he saw—there was a pile of newly felled and trimmed spindly trees near the river's edge. Closer to the mill itself, stacked and ready to be loaded into the machinery, was a pile of beautiful oak logs. Finest quality, all ready to be turned into timber and sold.

From living tree to logs to timber, and then granted a long new life as flooring, ships, furniture, everything in between. Beautiful.

Robert took out his pocket watch and checked the time. Time enough, he decided, to meet with Merevale, the head sawyer, and receive an update about the day's work at the mill. Then from there to his private audience with Lord and Lady Everglot. He'd best be careful not to get sawdust in his mustache or wood chips on his suit.

With a sigh he replaced his watch and wondered whether there was any way out of this meeting. Not that he wasn't honored to be asked, of course. Such an offer meant acceptance into the old guard, the old money and old society. Many others in Sir Robert Glottberg's position would give their right hands for an opportunity like this one. The Van Dorts, for instance.

And of course, Robert could do with an heir. There was the mill to think of, and the baronetcy, now. Due to his work and lack of opportunity, he'd somehow managed to make it to forty years of age without ever taking a wife. Married life would be something to get used to. He did not know much at all about Miss Victoria. He knew her by sight, and had attended her coming out party in the spring, but that was all. Miss Victoria seemed quiet and polite, a trifle on the shy side. Pretty enough. Only just nineteen...

"Sir?" came a quiet voice from behind him, so quiet it was nearly swallowed up by the roar of the water rushing through the mill wheel. "Ex-excuse me? Sir?"

Robert turned to find the Van Dort boy coming across the yard toward him. He carried a leather satchel in one hand and a small glass jar in the other. The young man had shot up over the past year, he truly had, just like a sapling. A nice enough lad, but quiet. Tended to blend into the village scenery. Robert had often seen him ambling through the woods, muttering to himself as he took down notes and sketches. Actually, young Master Van Dort had had to be steered away from lumbering operations more than once, having wandered too close while concentrating on something else. For all that, though, a good young man.

"Ah, Master Van Dort!" Robert said jovially, striding over and extending a hand. Victor, who had that certain stoop of the very tall and terminally shy, for a moment looked as though he expected to get a wallop. When Robert grinned, though, his face relaxed.

"How do you do?" the boy said, returning the handshake. Robert was surprised to find it was a firm one.

"What brings you all the way out here, young man?" Robert asked. "Tell your father those packing crates will be finished when they're finished."

"Oh, er, yes, all right," said Victor, scratching the back of his neck. "Though I did come about something else, if it's not too much bother. If it is a bother, of course, I'll leave. Perhaps I will just leave now, and come back when-"

Robert stopped the young man with a firm clasp on the shoulder. When he spoke it was in the careful, quiet tone he used with men who'd just had a finger snipped off by a hatchet. It seemed to be the only way to talk to the boy. "No bother, none at all. What may I do for you?"

"Well, sir," Victor said earnestly, "I've been tracking some moths in the birches near the river. Gypsy moths. They feed on birch trees, and I've found quite a few in that little stand on the far side of the church. Today I went to look, and...well...the birches were gone. I thought perhaps you'd cut them—er, well, had someone cut them down. Sir."

Robert raised an eyebrow. He'd never heard Victor Van Dort string so many sentences together at once. Then he shrugged, and steered Victor toward the pile of felled birch. "If you think you can find what you're looking for, have at, my boy. Just mind you don't upset the pile."

As Victor pussy-footed his gangly way over the felled trees, Robert tucked his thumbs into his lapels and considered. Of a sudden, watching the young man, he felt terribly old. Miss Victoria was this boy's age. She should be clambering over trees and going on rambles in the wood, too. Or whatever it was that aristocratic girls did instead. Dashed if he knew.

"Got it!" called Victor from the birch pile. He held aloft his glass jar, though at this distance Robert could not see what it held. Whatever it was pleased the boy, though, for he stumbled twice over the logs on his way over due to an inability to tear his gaze away.

On the second stumble Robert was close enough to catch him by the arm to steady him. With a sheepish grin Victor held up the jar. Inside was some sort of cocoon, attached to the tiniest wisp of birch bark.

"Thank you very much, sir!" Victor said, stowing his prize in his satchel. "And pleasure to see you, sir."

"Glad to be of service, Master Victor," Robert said, shaking the boy's hand again. With a smile and a wave, Victor began to make his way back down the path toward the village, a subtle but definite spring in his step.

Ah, to be that age again. Free and not quite yet adult, no great weight on one's shoulders, no true responsibilities. Robert did miss that feeling. When Victor had disappeared from view, Robert turned and walked into the cool shadows of the mill.

Inside, the first of the huge oak logs were being loaded onto the mechanized carriage that led to the head saw. Merevale was at the switch, back to him. Robert watched, arms folded, as the logs were fed one by one into the saw. It was hypnotic. No matter how many times he saw the machinery do its work, he was always impressed. The enormous circular saw, tall as a man and then some, moving so fast it was a blur, the deafening buzz, the satisfying clunk as the pieces of split log fell to either side and were pulled away by the junior sawyers. Sawdust filling the air, the scents of wood and heat and metal and work. His mill had a magic all its own.

A young lady, particularly a well-bred one, might not fully appreciate all this. And why should she? No, she deserved dinners and rambles and a life of leisure with a kind young lad her own age, not a dreary life with an old duffer who constantly smelled of sawdust and had half his life behind him. If nothing else, Robert was sure he'd regret it sooner or later. After all, youth called to youth, there was no getting around that. Miss Victoria seemed a nice young woman, hardly the sort he'd want to make miserable.

_I will respectfully decline, _he decided. The Everglots would be be all right in the end. There must be another prospect about somewhere for their daughter. And Miss Everglot...well, if she stayed about, he could still enjoy looking at her, conversing at parties, suchlike. He was happy enough as an old bachelor, anyway. Old dogs and new tricks and leopards and spots and what have you.

Just then there was a clunk, audible over the sound of the head saw. The next log in line had slipped a bit off the track. With a glance Robert watched the current log being split cleanly and in two, in a hot whir of sawdust. He would have to be quick about it. One leap took him to the platform beside the mechanized carriage. The saw was still running, but he'd been around this machinery for years. He knew precisely how long it took a log to get to the head saw, and was confident he'd have time to set the log right. Robert put his shoulder into it and strained. At last the log rolled back into place, and he made to leap down again only to find that he was unable to move.

His foot. His foot was caught under the log. Panic overrode the pain of his surely broken foot, for a broken foot could be dealt with. Unlike a collision with a massive circular saw.

"Merevale!" he screamed, trying as best he could to lean over the log to get the man's attention. "For the love of Christ, _turn off the saw!_"

But it was too late. Robert could feel the little breeze made by the ferociously spinning blade at his back. That buzz, so pleasant mere moments ago, now sounded like a shriek. The log kept moving, seeming to crush his foot more with every advancing inch. Desperate, sweating, terrified, he tried to muscle the log off of its carriage so that he could free his foot and leap away. But he lost his precarious balance and fell backward.

The circular saw bit into his back with a sickening wet noise, and then a crunch and squeal as the blade met his bones. The log was pushing him into it, holding him there. If he screamed he couldn't hear himself over the noise of the hot saw eating into flesh and bone. A dark red shower of blood clouded his vision, covering him, the log, and the machinery. Robert was aware of the blinding, inhuman pain only for a few agonizing seconds before he lost consciousness. The last thing he felt was the bite of the blade cutting into the back of his head, the last thing he heard was metal meeting the thick bone of his skull, the last thing he saw was the oak log he braced against coated in his own blood.

0—0

Robert's first thought upon regaining consciousness was, _Thank God, someone is sounding an alarm! _

Opening his eyes he saw that he was sitting in an alleyway, propped up on an overturned box. And next to him sat a skeleton in a plum frock coat.

"Well hello, old chap," said a voice he recognized immediately. It was one he'd not heard in years. "Terribly sorry for you, of course. But it is good to see you again."

"Captain Wadleigh?" Robert asked, confused. The Captain had been a fixture in the village when Robert was a young man, and he'd grown to be a mentor of sorts. He'd been dead for at least fifteen years...Realization slowly dawned. The last few moments he'd spent alive flashed back to him all at once. The blood, the crunch, the squeal...Robert pushed it aside. Those memories were no good now.

And now that he looked more closely, he saw that they were sitting on an overturned coffin. Pine. Made from Glottberg Lumber, if he was not mistaken.

"Eh, titles don't matter much anymore. Do call me Alfred," said Cap—Alfred, his tone genial and uncle-ish, just as it had been in life. While now he was a dapper skeleton in moth-eaten clothes, the voice and the impressive mustache had not changed a whit. He looked Robert up and down, and added, "By Jove, old Bernie was dead serious. You _are _in a state."

"I had...a spot of trouble," Robert agreed slowly, noticing now that his voice had a strange echoey quality. His eyes weren't quite aligned, either. He was beyond sensation now, thank goodness, but looking down at himself he could see that he had been cut cleanly in half vertically. The line was clear, particularly in the spots where his two halves didn't quite meet. If he moved just so, he could hear squelches and pops as his halves tried to separate.

"Nice clean cut," Alfred said approvingly. Robert gave half a nod.

"It's what Glottberg Lumber is known for," he said, even now with a spark of pride.

"Come on, come inside," said Alfred as he stood. Robert followed, a bit too quickly it seemed, for his right half made it to its foot before the left did. Once he righted himself as much as he could, he carefully followed Alfred through a little doorway.

They were at the top of a set of stairs, looking out into..._My my, a pub!_ thought Robert. A bloody nice one. A piano, a billiard table, a dart board, a stage. Remarkably clean and well-kept for being full of corpses. Corpses like him. Again Robert pushed away the memory of his death, pushed aside the grief over his loss of life, and tried to be a sport. Awkward, attempting to keep his halves safely together-for he'd spotted a few lady corpses in the crowd-he followed Alfred down the stairs into the pub. Skeletons parted to make way, a few stopping him to shake his hand.

"Ah, there's our new arrival!" cried a stout woman wearing a toque. Robert squinted. He felt he knew her, too. She came up and took his hand in greeting even as she said over her shoulder,"You see, Paul! New alarm works like a charm, I told you so!"

Paul! Paul he remembered. From the Tavern, where he and Wadleigh would meet for a quiet pint now and then. Shame about poor Paul, all that was left of him was his head. A head which was now jauntily coming down the bar toward him.

"Bienvenue, mon ami!" said Paul, spinning in a little circle has the cockroaches that carried him went this way and that. "Ah, it is as they have been saying! You must be happy to be here—you have split at your seam!"

Robert, frankly taken aback by the unexpected and downright _terrible _joke, was about to retort. But he had barely opened one half of his mouth when more shouts filled the pub.

"Why, you're _twice _the man I remember!"

"Funny, he's _half _the man I remember!"

"Oh, now now then, leave him be...he's probably got a _splitting _headache!"

"So this is the afterlife? This is what death is?" Robert asked Alfred, whose skeleton grin betrayed nothing. "Comedians in a pub, eh?"

"The alarm went off a while ago," Alfred told him, stepping up to the bar. "And then old Bernie found you outside. He came in to tell us you were there and what you looked like. This lot has been working on material ever since."

"I see," said Robert, really having to work at keeping his lips working together. It was as if his entire body was a belligerent team of loggers that he had to keep in line.

"Have a pint?" Alfred asked as he rapped his skeletal knuckles on the bar. "Or perhaps just a half?"

"Very funny indeed, old man," Robert replied. Alfred chuckled and asked Paul for two pints. Of what, Robert was not sure. It was pea-green and burbling, that was all he cared to know.

"It gets a little easier," said Alfred, handing over Robert's pint. "Death, I mean to say. And a bit of fun does help. Here, come have a listen, Mrs. Hughes is giving her Hamlet."

Interested, Robert followed Albert to a small table near the piano. Theatre was unheard of in the village. Even Bowdler's work was deemed improper by popular opinion. And Mrs. Hughes, of all people! In life she'd been an unremarkable village matron, married to one of Van Dort's employees. Who knew she'd have such depths?

But no mistake, that was her indeed, now a desiccated corpse in a maroon dress and matching wide-brimmed hat. Standing center stage, she began to declaim in plummy tones.

"To be, or not to be, that is the question," she began, with the easy grace and tilted knowing smile of a performer who had done her routine many times, and knew precisely what to expect of her audience. Indeed, there arose from the audience a swell of cheering and whistling, and a few anticipatory giggles here and there.

"Whether tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune..."

"I say, get to the good part!" someone shouted, and every corpse in the place seemed to agree.

"To die..." Mrs. Hughes let the sentence hang. A great laugh came from the assembled dead. After a moment a skeleton wearing a bowler hat spoke up from where he leaned against the proscenium arch.

"What is it?" he asked in a gravelly voice. The question was immediately echoed by the rest of the audience, even Alfred. Mrs. Hughes offered a demure smile.

"To sleep!" she said, and another laugh rolled through the pub.

"I'm not tired!" came a shout from the back, and even Mrs. Hughes joined in the laughter this time.

"For in that sleep of death," she continued over the noise, "What dreams may come, when we have shuffled off this mortal coil, must give us pause..."

"By George," Alfred said when his chuckles had subsided, even going so far as to wipe at the corner of his eye socket with a bony finger, "I never properly understood how _amusing _the Bard was, not until I arrived down here."

Robert took a swig of his drink. "One really must see it performed," he agreed, having read that somewhere or other.

As Mrs. Hughes continued her soliloquy to general hilarity, catcalls, and the occasional rim shot from the skeleton at the drums, Robert gave himself a moment to settle his mind. Literally, as it seemed to him that one half of his bisected brain was listing ever so slightly to starboard. Raymond would be the baronet now. And after that his son, Ralph. And unless a miracle occurred, Robert could only foresee his beloved sawmill being run into the ground. Oh, but Raymond would like the title well enough…Robert shook his head in disappointment, one half taking a moment to catch up with the other. Later he'd have to find his grave so that he could have a good and proper roll in it. While there was nothing to be done, he couldn't help but feel hurt. His mill, which he'd worked so hard for, had built and lovingly maintained, had been the end of him.

_Outrageous fortune, indeed, _he thought, and took another drink.


	6. Miss Plum and the Kitchen Staff

**Author's Note: **If you're just joining the story here, you should read the "Paul, The Head Waiter" chapter for a bit of background. It's not strictly necessary, but it provides some set-up. Also, concrit would be greatly appreciated for this, particularly the ending. Thanks!

**Miss Plum and the Kitchen Staff**

One cold, gray morning, Agnes sat down heavily at the worn and battered wooden table in the kitchen. For the third day in a row she was sick as a mongrel dog. She hoped that a nice spot of sugary tea would help. Boris was still sick, too—he'd not even bothered to get up this morning. She let him be in his little room off the kitchen. Brother or no, accident or not...she'd not quite forgiven him. And Boris hadn't quite forgiven himself. Most like he never would.

Blank, trying to ignore her roiling stomach and the increasing sharp pain in her middle, she stared around the kitchen. She'd draped what she could in black, including the door to the dumbwaiter. The stove was not lit, and the shade was drawn over the window in the back door. The room was chilly and damp and oppressively quiet, the dark sky threatening rain outside. Not even the clock made a sound. Agnes had not bothered to wind it again after she'd stopped it on that awful day. No deliveries, no marketing, no cooking or preparations. She lacked the gumption even to send out for essentials, like tea and sugar—the sugar she'd been using for the past few days was the very last, the dregs she'd found in a battered silver tin tucked into the back of a cabinet.

There had been no business at all, not for weeks. Not since the Van Dort wedding. The festivities had been a trifle dampened by the village doctor and undertaker taking their notes and doing their work in one corner of the dining room. The serving had been all up to Agnes-Boris had been indisposed, as the constable had had a few questions for him. After an hour of Agnes dripping tears into their food and lethargic roaches lumbering around the table, Van Dorts had opted not to stay in the carefully prepared bridal suite. Recent death had rather ruined the atmosphere.

Poor Paul. Agnes still couldn't believe he was really gone. His handsome head taken right off, falling down the dumbwaiter shaft and rolling clear into the kitchen. Trailing gore until it hit the table leg and came to a stop. Not that she'd seen that. Boris had taken care not to let her see a thing until he'd got it cleaned up a bit, and had wrapped Paul's head, respectful-like, in a tea towel. But oh, she could imagine it well enough. Though it was kind of her brother to try to keep the worst from her. He'd always known how she felt about Paul, no matter how many other fellows there had been. And there had been a few over the years. It was one of those open secrets in the village. Agnes took a difficult sip of tea, her mouth tingling. She coughed.

Bless him, Boris had not said a word when she'd neglected to send every bit of Paul back to France. In response to her letter informing them of his passing, Paul's family had asked for his body. And his body they had received. Surely they'd never miss his head. Agnes _needed _some part of him here, buried in the churchyard. Fifteen years he'd been here. This village had become his home. The Tavern had been his home. Sometimes Agnes allowed herself to think, to dream, that _she'd _been part of home for him. Able to pretend, sometimes, that they were an old married couple. In all ways but an important few, that's just what the two of them had been, a bit.

It was the closest she'd ever come, anyway. Once one of the prettiest girls in the village, never lacking for lads, she'd gone matronly before her time—sleek black hair forever in a bun, stout frame always swathed in dark colors and covered with an apron. Wifely. Just what she was trying to be, what Paul never really saw. Fifteen years she'd wasted, playing house. She was alone but for her brother, with a leaky old pile of a building that she didn't want and couldn't keep, but with nowhere else to go and nothing else to do. And she was an old maid.

Swallowing back a sob, Agnes took a big swig of tea. Immediately her throat convulsed, making her gasp and choke. The pain her guts was even worse now. Looking down, she noticed strange red splotches on her hands.

_Boris, _she thought. She should get Boris. They'd fetch the doctor. She'd never felt this sick before. Dizzy, nauseous, and her face feeling as if it was on fire, Agnes heaved herself up from the table. She was having trouble keeping upright. Bent nearly double from the pain in her stomach, unable to swallow, she staggered her way to the door of Boris' tiny room. She braced herself against the doorframe.

"Boris?" she croaked, the effort of speaking just that one word making her feel faint. There was no reply. Squinting in an attempt to bring her swimming vision back to normal, Agnes saw Boris sprawled on his cot against the far wall. Even from this distance she could tell something was very wrong. His eyes were open, and his chest didn't rise or fall.

When she took a breath, her middle clenched, and she turned and vomited into the bowl in the washstand next to the door. Before she passed out, she just had time to register the strange blue-green color of the sick puddled there in the basin.

_Now that's odd, it is, _was her last muddled thought as she sank to the cold stone floor.

0—0

Perhaps being violently sick had been just the ticket, for when Agnes woke she felt just fine. Perhaps she'd dreamed wandering into Boris' room, for she was sitting at the kitchen table again, as though she'd never moved. Cautiously she stretched, thinking it strange that she was a little numb. A side effect of whatever her illness had been? Would the numbness pass, too?

Then Agnes took a good look around. Her kitchen was all wrong. Where the massive black stove should be was an old-fashioned open hearth and fireplace, like the sort her mother used to have. There was even a large iron pot hanging over the fire. The _green _fire. The ceiling was too low, and the back door, ajar and offering a glimpse into a dark alley beyond, had no window. Instead of a staircase leading upstairs, there was only a doorway with swinging saloon doors leading who knew where.

Suddenly filled with dread, Agnes stood from the table. The table which, she saw now, looked as though it had been cobbled together from bits of coffins and caskets. She could see the odd hinge and raggedy bit of silk lining here and there, even. With an airless gasp she backed up until she hit the sideboard, another bit of furniture seemingly built from tomb leftovers. The cutlery and silverware rattled in their canisters atop the sideboard, and one of the drawers, also filled with utensils, fell a bit open upon impact.

"I'm dead," she said, looking around but not letting her gaze settle on anything. "I died. I'm dead." She held a hand up to her bosom. No heartbeat. She raised the same hand up to her mouth and attempted to breathe on it, but no breath came. Agnes wondered if the rest of her had turned the same shade of violent blue as her hand.

Dead. Alone in a kitchen. With outdated equipment and mismatched cutlery. For eternity. Was this some sort of punishment?

Agnes leaned back against the sideboard, watching the green flames flicker merrily under the pot in the fireplace. From beyond the saloon doors came, strangely, the ringing of a bell. Wondering, she turned her head in that direction just as Boris came through the doors.

"Agnes," he said by way of greeting. He came up to her, looking a bit sad and uncertain, his movements as slow and lumbering as ever. Boris was the same shade of blue she was, and his eyes were sunken. Whoever had buried him had buried him in the one nice set of clothes he owned—his whites. Looking down at herself, Agnes saw that the same was true of her. Her whites _were _the only nearly nice things she owned. Pristine as a wedding gown, too, as she'd never worn them every day, as Paul had wanted.

For a moment they stared at one another. Then Boris said, "It was you they were ringing the bell for. I'm sorry. But I did figure. They rung the bell for me, too."

"Oh," said Agnes, thinking she understood. "A bell gets rung for the fresh dead, eh?" Boris nodded. It was a nice idea, in its way. Like church bells for a wedding or a christening. Only not quite as somber. This bell had sounded like a dinner bell. Merry, sort of.

"I'm sorry, too," she said after a moment. "What happened? How'd we get so sick?"

Boris looked at her with big, sad, cow-like eyes. "I've thought on it. Meant to tell you, but got down here before I could. Agnes, what sugar did you use?"

"What was left, the old stuff in that little canister..." She trailed off, understanding dawning. Clear as day the memory came...the last time she'd been with Paul..._Borax. Mix with sugar...Dead little roaches_. And she'd told Boris. Looking at her brother's broad dead face, Agnes knew she'd guessed right. She was stunned speechless, but only for a moment. Furious, she reached out for whatever weapon was closest—a fork, it turned out—and she jammed it into her dead brother's head, just above his ear.

"Ow!" he cried, though she knew it was more in surprise than pain. He was dead, after all. "What are you doing?"

Agnes snatched up a cheese grater and hurled it right into his face. "You put leftover _poison_ back into a _food _cabinet?!" she shouted. "Where anybody might use it?"

"You didn't notice it were blue?" Boris asked in return, his voice feeble, chastened. But it wasn't enough for Agnes.

Raging, she dug her hands into the cutlery drawer and pulled out random utensils. More forks, ladles, a peeler, a potato masher, a whisk. And knives, quite a few knives, some in her hands blade-first, not that it mattered to her dead flesh. Some she threw at Boris, and others she plunged as deep and hard as she could into his back and head.

"Agnes! Get off!" he cried, holding up his arms in a vain attempt to ward her off. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry! It were stupid, I'm sorry!"

"I'll give you 'sorry'!" Agnes fumed, running out of silverware and having to settle for whipping a dishcloth at him. He'd been the death of them all, he had. That brother of hers!

Only the sound of the saloon doors creaking open stopped her. She looked up to see a slender dead young man standing in the doorway, black hair frizzing out to either side beneath his toque. He was also wearing whites, just like hers and Boris'. Slightly embarrassed, Agnes stepped away from her brother, who finally felt it safe enough to stand up straight. One of his eyes had been knocked a bit loose in the kerfuffle, and he had so many kitchen utensils sticking out of him that he looked like some sort of culinary hedgehog.

"Anger stage, Miss Plum," said the young man, his voice quiet and familiar. "Perfectly normal. I went through it myself. You'll accept it all soon. It helps to keep busy, I found. I'm very glad Monsieur needed the help!" With that, he stepped over to a shelf by the fireplace and began taking down dusty brown bottles, which he set on a large silver tray waiting on a side table.

While Agnes had no idea what he was nattering on about, she remembered who he was the minute he said her name. Vincent. A Van Dort. He'd done fish deliveries to the Tavern until his unfortunate and untimely run-in with an unsecured load of herring on ice. Young Vincent had brightened up her Fridays, that was certain. And Monsieur, he'd said. Could it be? Oh, that would be just like her Paul, doing what he loved. She'd often teased him that they'd find him doing his job five years after he died. Turned out she'd been right.

"Monsieur Paul said to tell you to have a little drink," Vincent said gently, handing over a bottle, "and then come out to say hello. He sends his apologies about the circumstances, but he'd very much like to see you."

Agnes took the bottle and took a swig, not bothering with a glass. Vincent nodded, hoisted the tray onto his shoulder, and then left through the swinging doors. Whatever the drink was made her calm immediately. Almost cheerful again. Or maybe that was just hearing Paul's name.

"Nice to see Paul again, it was," Boris said, coming up behind her. "He were just as mad as you, at first. But we're all friendly-like again, now." Feeling warm and generous of a sudden, Agnes handed him the bottle, just to show no hard feelings.

"Sorry about that little tantrum," she told him, even as she tried to decide what she was going to say to Paul. She smoothed down her whites and poked at her hair, thinking that she'd have to find a toque of her own. Boris shrugged.

"At least I won't be losing my knives the way I used to," he said, fingering the handle of the one she'd stabbed him in the back of the neck with.

Eternity in a kitchen. With her brother and Paul and with Vincent Van Dort. Maybe it wasn't a punishment at all. It was all too much like her happiest years to be a punishment. Somehow she knew that if she wanted, she could be here to stay. It was all too perfect, really.

"Come on, then," Agnes said, giving her apron one more adjustment and making her way toward the swinging doors. "Show me round the new place, Boris. And no hard feelings, right?"

Boris grinned a slow grin. "No hard feelings," he agreed. "No real point to'em any more."

With that, they left the kitchen together, letting the saloon doors swing to an unhurried stop behind them.


	7. Grandfather Everglot

**Author's Note:** If you've read my other stories, I'll have to ask you to disregard some of the backstory implied in "Carolers." Or you can chalk it up to Maudeline being Maudeline. I've had a few new ideas since, and I frankly like them better. That said, please enjoy!

**Edit! **I've tweaked one thing and added a bit at the end, I hope it is an improvement! Thanks, reviewer, for pointing out the confusions.

**Grandfather Everglot**

Troubled and wakeful, Phineas, Lord Everglot, slowly wheeled himself in his Bath chair down the portrait gallery. The hall clock had just gone half-past two in the morning.

Slowly, painfully, he pushed himself along. Finally he had to stop for breath at the end of the gallery, under the portrait of his grandfather, Felix, the very first Lord Everglot. The very first nobleman in the village. Before they were barons, the Everglots had been knights. Leaders of men, descended from the very best families of four nations. This village was theirs from its very beginnings. The Everglot name and legacy had been handed down and maintained and cultivated for centuries. Phineas valued that name more than his own life.

Names, old families, endured. They endured as nothing else did. At this very late stage in his life, his name was the only thing Phineas had left.

He glanced about in the gloom, and then, once he had confirmed that he was alone, Phineas pulled a decanter of sherry from beneath his lap rug. He'd not bothered to bring a glass. Pulling the crystal stopper he lifted the bottle to his lips and took a guilty swig.

If his Grandfather Felix could see him now, what he'd become...oh, he'd most likely roll in his grave. Old, decrepit, confined always to his bed or his chair, enjoying his sherry far too much. Phineas took another swallow, a dribble running down the corner of his mouth and dripping onto his dressing gown. For all the indignities of age, he still deserved the respect of his title, of his place as patriarch. This latest insult was more than he could stand.

No one had bothered to ask him to choose a wife for Finis. No, his daughter-in-law hadn't even thought to ask. Not that she ever did in anything else, either—she'd become much worse since Fergus had died. She did precisely as she liked. Margaret had made the match. No blood relation! No true Everglot! No longer even the baroness! And _she _had had the audacity to choose the next Lady Everglot.

No permission was asked. Merely his blessing. Bah! Today's tea with Miss Elvstead and her aunt and uncle, Alfred and Gertrude Wadleigh, had had the air of an afterthought, of humoring him. Letting him think he had an opinion worth hearing. Past his prime or not, he was still Lord Everglot, by God. In practice, of course, Finis had taken on many of the duties and responsibilities required of the position, but the title still belonged to Phineas. It was his until he died. They'd have to pry the Everglot ring from his cold dead finger.

Phineas grunted angrily and tried to shove the stopper back into the decanter. His shaky old hand lost its precarious grip, and the stopper fell to the marble floor with a clatter. Phineas swore, his words echoing down the gallery. As the echo faded he heard a new sound, soft slippered footfalls from the gloom. He turned to see his granddaughter Lavinia step from the shadows. Rumpled and drawn, wearing a tattered old dressing gown, she looked more like a woman of fifty than a girl of twenty-two. Moving slowly and deliberately she bent and retrieved the stopper, and stood for a moment turning it over in her hands before she held it out to him.

"Thank you," he grumbled, taking it. After his next fumbled attempt at stoppering the decanter failed he swore again, and held it out to Lavinia. "Bah! Here, you do it."

The dainty little hands that took the decanter were so pale that they seemed to glow in the darkness. As a little girl she'd always been so rosy. All the Everglot women were, always had been. Rosy-cheeked, small-featured, plump and blonde. Lavinia had been a real beauty, before her troubles. When she handed the decanter back Phineas averted his eyes from the angry scar that marred one pale wrist. He knew very well she had a matching one on her other arm.

"What is your opinion of Miss Elvstead, Grandfather?" Lavinia asked abruptly. Ever since she'd returned from the sanitarium, it seemed, she'd had little patience for niceties or decorum. Frankly, Phineas didn't mind, so long as she wasn't shaming them in public. Her mother had only allowed her in the drawing room today because she had agreed to remain silent, control her tears and temper, and to leave after shaking hands with Miss Elvstead. Phineas, head of the household and head of the family, had been under similar orders, as outrageous and insulting as that was.

A decrepit old man and a mad young woman. They had quite a bit in common. Not least all the time they spent kept in the house.

"She is not the match I would have chosen," he replied, shifting in his wheeled chair and disarranging his lap rug in the process. While Lavinia knelt and straightened it for him, he went on, "The Elvsteads are an old, good family, but with each generation they seem to lose more and more of their breeding. It's deplorable, what they've become. Scandal every time you look at them."

Lavinia remained kneeling next to him, arms folded on top of the wheel, her long blonde curls falling loose. A cross, hurt expression twisted her round face. "Why, add the lost money to the list, and you might as well be speaking of our family, Grandfather."

"You are not a scandal, Lavinia," he told her gruffly, ignoring the crass but true comment about money. "Your brother might think so, your mother, and your father, God rest him, but they are quite wrong. You've had troubles, that's all. Such things do happen, but we've fixed it all, haven't we? You behave as you should now, there's no scandal in that."

Lavinia smiled without any mirth whatever. "You are very generous, Grandfather. But an Everglot in a sanit-" Phineas stopped her with a raised hand.

"Enough," he said, again removing the stopper from the decanter. He took a long swallow of sherry, smacking his lips when he'd finished. "You took the waters. For reasons of health. That's all."

There was a silence. The two of them sat there in the shadowy gloom of the gallery, the chill of the hall settling in around them, their ancestors gazing down upon them from their frames. Each and every one of them had walked this gallery. Sometimes, when it was late, and dark, and quiet, such as now, their footsteps and breath could almost be heard. Phineas and Lavinia, and Finis, the heir, had the Everglot legacy in their keeping. For that legacy to even be in _slight_ question, why...it was intolerable.

"You're of delicate health, all noble women are," Phineas added in a low voice. Nodding with finality, he grunted and took a touch more sherry. Ah, finally, the world was beginning to go soft, his feelings and thoughts were losing their hard edge. Fuzzily he looked at the mostly empty decanter, then at his granddaughter. Scandal indeed. It was only a scandal if people _knew_.

"The Elvsteads, for instance," he went on, gesturing with the stopper, "Just look at them. Minor nobility in the first place. The Wadleighs, the ones who took tea with us today? Eloped, after quite a bit of public shame. Miss Elvstead herself, with her piano playing and her riding sidesaddle and her foreign schooling...and her father? General Elvstead, a general who was never in any army the rest of us knew about. And he married below himself, too, a dismal woman who finished up by putting a pistol to her-"

He broke off, remembering himself. Lavinia's pale face had gone slack and expressionless, but her eyes were filled with pain. Phineas, uncomfortable, coughed and adjusted his lap robe.

"The Elvsteads put their troubles out in public," he finally grumbled. "That is all I meant to say. It's not befitting. And it seems as if all the troubles are in the female line. That Maudeline will be bearing future Everglots. Bad blood outs eventually. It always does. When Finis returns, I'll be sure to speak with him before he meets her."

There was another silence, this one punctuated by the tiny noise of Lavinia chewing on her thumbnail. Phineas turned his head a bit so that he didn't have to see. Sometimes she would chew until she bled, and never notice.

"I don't think she's quite the lady she pretends she is," Lavinia murmured, almost to herself. Phineas looked at her in surprise. Lavinia continued to talk around her thumbnail, staring into the middle distance. "Maudeline. I can tell. I don't know if it's bad blood, Grandfather, as you call it, but...there's something underneath all that propriety. And it's not the riding, or music. It's almost as if she's...cornered. Afraid. I could tell when I saw her eyes."

"So could I," admitted Phineas. Yes, he'd noticed. You would have to be a fool, or his daughter-in-law, not to notice. So long as it, whatever it might be, was kept quiet, and that he and Lavinia were the only ones to suspect, scandal could be kept at bay. If Maudeline Elvstead was truly as well-bred as her bearing, education, and chin displayed, then she would also desire to avoid open scandal at all cost.

In the end, the Everglot name was all they had. The only thing that would last. It must remain untainted.

Phineas opened his mouth to tell Lavinia that it was quite late, they should retire, but instead of words a tumble of gibberish fell from his lips. And then, the worst pain he had ever known exploded in his right temple.

"Grandfather?" Lavinia cried. It sounded as though her voice had traveled down a long tunnel. Phineas tried to turn his head to look at her, but his body seemed beyond his control. The dark was increasing, he could no longer see. The decanter tumbled from his slack, useless hand, the crash as it shattered on the marble floor reaching him only dimly.

"Don't let there be a scandal," he tried to tell her, knowing he was out of time. But his mouth no longer worked, his throat could only croak. As Lavinia fled for help, Phineas sank into himself, everything around him a dark fog.

0—0

The next thing Phineas knew he was standing in the very middle of a crowded, dingy tavern. It was louder than any place he had ever been, with shouts and piano music. Every angle was off-kilter, and the colors were somehow brighter than normal colors could ever be. Where on Earth...?

And then he realized. He was not on Earth. Not strictly speaking, at any rate. He was somewhere...other. He'd never see Earth again. A different sort of man might have swallowed with emotion. Phineas merely cleared his throat, held his distinctly Everglot head high, and took in the scene, unable to keep from thinking about how dreadfully _common_ this all was. Once he might have said he would never be caught dead in such a place...

Four pairs of skeletons danced an exuberant polka, their tattered clothes aflutter, laughing as they spun. The dead woman at the coffin-shaped piano was small but sturdy, and had been buried in a grey silk gown. From where he could see her profile, Phineas saw that she had one doe-like eye left, and a heart-shaped, nearly fleshless face. What skin remained was pale blue. When she turned her head to flash the dancers a skeletal grin, Phineas saw the bullet-hole in her temple.

_She never seemed that gay when she was alive_, he thought, not without a hint of disapproval. As he glanced around at the corpses making merry, cavorting, and pouring pints down their decaying throats, Phineas frowned.

"I have died, and I have gone to Hell," he said, adjusting his periwig. He took a step backward, intending to find somewhere quiet so that he could rest in peace, but instead trod on the foot of the corpse behind him.

"Oh! Sorry!" said a croaky voice from below him. There were not many men who Phineas Everglot could _physically _look down upon, but here was one of the few.

Standing there looking sheepishly up at him, a saber sticking out of his middle, was dwarfish General Adrin, nearly overwhelmed by the hat of his dress uniform. They had never been on _social _terms, not by any stretch. Adrin had lived at the Tavern, a lifelong bachelor.

"I do beg your pardon-your Lordship?" he finished with rising inflection, and stepping back in deference. "So sorry for your loss of life."

Phineas nodded his acknowledgment. He wished he could say the same to Adrin, but he knew that barmy old Adrin had gone just the way he'd wanted to go, he and his even madder friend-

"Lord Everglot!" broke in General Sutherland, coming up to them. A huge hole was ripped through his middle, spoiling his Dragoon uniform. With one easy movement he swung Adrin up onto a convenient table by the saber handle, and then offered a salute. "Bly me, pleasure to see you. Hasn't ever really felt _natural_ down here without an Everglot! Welcome!"

Again, all Phineas offered was a nod. Out of their trees, the pair of them. Completely. He would have to make sure he did his best to spend eternity far away from this pair.

"General!" called Sutherland over his shoulder, "I say, man, come see who's joined our ranks!"

_Another _of them? It could only be...Phineas drew himself up to full height and put on his most imperious face when the third general came to join them.

"You! Elvstead!" barked Phineas. The corpse paused, stein halfway to his mouth, and looked Phineas up and down. As in life, the man was very tall, with a handlebar mustache. His chin was his most arresting attribute, hanging down almost to his collarbone. Like the other two he wore his dress uniform. As his had been a quiet death, it was still in rather good condition, but for a patch of mold here and there.

"No one's called me that in a dog's age," hiccuped General Elvstead. "Around here they call me Vitgenshtein! Right, lads? Wellington? _Bones_-apart?" He laughed and hoisted his stein at his fellow veterans, who returned the gesture with raucous laughs of their own. Phineas waited for the hilarity to subside.

"What's all this about your daughter marrying my grandson?" he demanded, quite forgetting in his annoyance that Elvstead had been dead for three years and had nothing to do with it. "Tell me now, is there anything she's hiding? Will she make a proper Everglot?" Phineas knew he was barely making sense, and that Elvstead was barely sober, but he had to know. He'd never rest completely until he was sure that his great-grandchildren would be of good blood.

The mention of his daughter seemed to sober Elvstead up. "Maudeline? Marrying an Everglot?" he said wonderingly. He stroked his enormous chin. Then he grinned. "I say, what good luck for her! She's a fine girl, all told! Here, old boy, let's have a pint to celebrate!"

Before an aghast Phineas could think of a reply to this effrontery, Elvstead had clapped a hand on his shoulder, turned to the room, and cried, "Drinks for everyone! My daughter's getting married!" A cheer went up from the assembled dead. A young dead man in a worm-eated frock coat bent over the piano and tinkled the opening bars of the Bridal Chorus.

"I? Drink with _you_?" Phineas demanded, pulling away from Elvstead. "Are you mad? And answer my question!"

But Elvstead merely grinned again, passed around drinks that seemed to appear from nowhere, and began happily informing every corpse in the place of the fortuitous wedding going on "Upstairs." Lip curled, Phineas glowered at his moldy back until he disappeared into the scrum of the dead, seemingly headed for the piano.

"Oh now, your Lordship, we're all of equal rank here," said Sutherland, two mugs of something vile and frothy in either hand. "We put it on for fun now and then, but it's all behind us now."

"Death is the great equalizer," agreed Adrin. "Lords and commoners, generals and privates...they all drink here in the end!"

"Not I, thank you," said Phineas coldly. Still, he took the glass of what looked like sherry from the bartender before he turned away. "I have a position to uphold, dead or not. Goodbye." And, after a moment's pause, he took a second sherry glass in his other hand.

"'Bye, then," said Adrin, draining his glass. Sutherland, his hands still full, offered a beery salute.

"Good-bye, your lordship!" chorused what sounded like every single dead villager in attendance. He also thought he caught a few laughs and whistles. A barely sober skeleton near the door hiccuped and waved as he passed.

"Of all the disrespectful and outrageous...bah!" he grumbled as he went through the door out onto the square. Resolute, and ignoring the corpses who waved or greeted him as he stalked by, Phineas made for where, in the land of the living, the graveyard would be.

He was an Everglot, and he wanted to be alone. He'd always been alone, in the end.

Soon enough he came to a mass of gravestones, some in better shape than others. A graveyard in the land of the dead looked like something out of a storybook-wrought iron gate, grey tombs. And yet every angle was tilted, every color was bright, not the somber one would expect. Names began appearing on the stones and gates, ones that he recognized. Some were his relatives. Nearly every family in the village was connected somehow. Death didn't change that.

Phineas walked until he found the Everglot crypt. It was similar to its counterpart in the land above, except that here it seemed to glow bright green. He considered it for a moment, taking in the lack of shadows, the eerie glow, the little string of purple lights someone had put up between the marble columns on the exterior. Death's version of the Everglot mansion, more or less. Melancholy flooded him, and he felt on his finger for the Everglot ring.

It wasn't there. By God, they _had _pried it off his cold dead finger. Anger and a fresh feeling of loss replaced the melancholy, but subsided soon enough. At least the ring was on Finis's hand now.

The door of the crypt was open. Peeking in, he saw that several of the coffins were open and empty, including his late wife's. Even Grandfather Felix's. In all it had the look of a room at an inn awaiting its inhabitants at the end of the day. If he sat long enough, his family might return. Oh, he did hope they would.

His own casket was set into an alcove in the far wall, waiting for him. Careful not to upset his glasses, he climbed in, noting how very handsome a box it was. Finis and Lavinia had done well.

Sipping from his sherry glasses, Phineas, Lord Everglot, sat in his casket in his family's resting place, and waited. For what, he did not know. He would need to think about that. Perhaps for his fellow Everglots to return, supposing that they ever did. Perhaps for Elvstead to chance by, just in case. He supposed he did not have the patience to wait all the way until Judgment Day. Perhaps he could go back to that little pub, eventually. Just to make his lordly presence known. To remind his departed villagers that the Everglot name held power and prestige, even beyond the grave.

Besides, his glass of dead man's sherry could use a top-up.


	8. The Third Cook

**Author's Note:** Well, here you are, those who wondered. Here is the story of that third cook-that one who is constantly carrying Paul's head about on a tray. A few people asked about him when I mentioned him in the Miss Plum chapter. Enjoy!

**The Third Cook**

"Hear ye, hear ye!"

The town crier's call echoed throughout the square, as did the clang of his ever-present bell. Vincent Van Dort was startled out of his daydreaming by the noise, and gave such a start that he nearly toppled from the driver's seat of the Van Dort's Fish delivery wagon. He steadied himself against the dash, and, once collected, leaned out of the wagon's open side for a better look. From the little alley that ran between the clockmaker's and the Everglot mansion, he had a nice view of the village square. The clanging grew louder as the crier came into view.

"Funeral service suitably somber success!" the crier called. The crier turned this way and that, one hand cupped around his mouth. "Internment in the Everglot Vault to follow! Ten minutes!"

"Whoa, now," Vincent soothed the horse, who had started at the shouting. "Peony, take it easy, now."

After a bit more soothing the horse quieted, and Vincent leaned and gave her an affectionate pat on the flank. The crier's calls and clangs faded as he continued his seemingly constant one-man parade through the village streets. It would appear that Vincent and the crier were among the few villagers who were not attending Lord Everglot's funeral. It was traditional for villagers to turn out to mourn the loss of the local baron, despite the fact that only a select few would actually be allowed in the church. Tradespeople seemed to be the odd folks out. The news needed reporting, Vincent supposed. The Tavern needed to be open, such a fixture it was. And fish, which didn't keep, needed delivering. That was Vincent's job.

The fish wagon had been cousin William's crazy idea. He'd even built it himself, with Vincent's rather unenthusiastic help. It was an icehouse on wheels, more or less. In a village this size, the idea of deliveries seemed rather silly. Servants and housewives went to the market to buy fish from Uncle Theodore, and had done so for as long as anyone could remember. The two of them were among the crowd gathered out at the church. Trust William to be the one who tried to change things, particularly when he wasn't the one to actually drive the wagon...Though Vincent couldn't resent him entirely. Not when his job meant weekly deliveries to the Everglots'. Without this job, he'd never have caught a glimpse of her.

Her. Miss Everglot. Lavinia. He hardly dared even to think her first name. For a fishmonger to think about a baron's granddaughter the way he thought about Lavinia...it was unheard of. All the same, a man could dream. Even outlandish dreams.

Smiling a private little smile, Vincent drummed his fingers against the dash. He glanced up to the balcony on the mansion's second floor. It was just above the portico. Ivy crawled up the pillars and onto the balcony, and from there up the side of the house. That was where he usually saw her. Sitting in a little chair. Or standing behind the French doors and staring out when it was raining or chilly. It was a routine, a lovely routine. He'd finish his delivery at the tradesmen's entrance in back-most often brown trout, and always herring, both fresh and kippered-and then he would make his way back toward the square, pausing beside the portico. Up he'd glance, his heart skipping beats with excitement and anticipation.

Sometimes, he was certain, she'd seen him. She'd _noticed_. A few times she had seemed to smile, though he was always far enough away that he couldn't be sure if it was meant for him. Vincent hoped they were. The memory of those smiles kept him going through lonely weeks. Recently he'd grown a bit bolder, and had nodded to her if he fancied that she'd caught his eye. Once or twice he'd got up the gumption to even touch his cap. After those occasions, he'd barely been able to sleep for reliving it over and over.

"If we don't see her soon, we'll need to move on," he said to the horse. Seeming to understand, the horse nickered and tossed its head. "Miss Plum doesn't like us to be late. Neither does Monsieur."

Next to the Everglots', the Tavern was Vincent's favorite delivery stop. Next to the Everglots', the Tavern was Vincent's _only _delivery stop. Miss Plum was friendly, Monsieur even more so. The Tavern was really a remarkable place, at least to Vincent's admittedly inexperienced taste. So gentrified, so genteel. Vincent been allowed in the kitchen once, and he'd been immediately enamored. And then he'd seen Monsieur, so foreign and trim and professional in his livery. No dirty aprons or frozen fingers. Last week, as Boris unloaded a delivery of sardines and salmon, Miss Plum had taken a break from supervising to pull Vincent aside.

"I've spoken to Paul," she'd said. "He agrees we could use another pair of hands round here. Someone to be our third, you know? Help out Paul here and there, but mostly down in the kitchen with me. If you'd like."

"I'd like very much!" Vincent had said eagerly, so much so that he hadn't even waited for her to completely finish her sentence. Miss Plum had beamed, he'd beamed back, and suddenly the world looked brighter. The sun was sunnier, the drab colors of the village looked ever so slightly brighter, and even the fish he hauled about smelled a little fresher.

Monsieur Paul had even taken a moment to speak with him. Monsieur had even been kind enough to endure Vincent's admittedly fishy smell with only the slightest and most unobtrusive wrinkle of his nose.

"Ah, oui, you will be _parfait_, this I know!" Monsieur had said, putting a slim hand on Vincent's shoulder. "You I shall train to follow me, a Maitre d'Hotel, oui? And if Madame needs you here and there, you may also be her helper. Agreed?" Vincent had nodded and shaken Paul's hand with the distinct feeling he was joining an entirely new family. Van Dort's Fish was only a placeholder, he wasn't even a direct heir or anything like that. He was meant for better things than driving a wagon around.

Over the course of the week, his professional and romantic daydreams had blended together. Monsieur Paul would train him to be a "Mater de Hotel," and then Vincent would kick the dust of this dreary village from his feet and go see the world. Eventually he'd end in...oh, Spain. Maybe Germany, or Russia. Open a hotel, with his wife by his side. Lavinia Van Dort, who wouldn't mind in the least that he was poor and common. But such a thing was impossible. Noble women didn't marry fishmongers. Or Mater de hotels. Vincent frowned. What a fool he was. He'd never even spoken to her. Smiles and little waves didn't mean a thing. Not a thing.

Heavy of heart, he took one more look up at the empty balcony, the dark windows. Miss Everglot was most likely at the funeral. What a fool he was not to have thought of it. An utter, impossible fool. That was Vincent Van Dort.

He picked up the reins, feeling ridiculous and disheartened. At least he had the Tavern to look forward to. Perhaps Miss Plum had made blintzes today. Just the thing to help him feel a bit less bruised. He made to click his tongue to get Peony started.

"I do hope you brought trout today," said a husky, genteel voice. Vincent paused, his tongue in mid-click, and turned. Next to the wagon, next to _him_, stood Lavinia Everglot. His jaw dropped, his throat dried up, and his brain seemed to stop working for a few moments.

She was dainty and plump, and clad in mourning garb. She seemed swallowed up by the enormous hoop skirt and the big sleeves. Her black bonnet was draped with a black veil, so that he couldn't see her face properly. Somehow he was grateful that he couldn't see her eyes. Such a sight might send him swooning.

"I enjoy trout," she went on, running one small, black-gloved hand along the lettering on the side of the wagon. "My grandfather always did, as well."

Vincent was dumbstruck. Lavinia Everglot was standing right there. Talking to him. Touching his wagon. He gulped.

_Say something! _ he ordered himself. Vincent was terribly aware of how fishy the wagon smelled, how his apron was dirty, how silly he must look with his cap and his black hair frizzing out crazily to either side of his head. He blurted the first words that came into his head.

"I...I...I'm sorry about your grandad, it was a real shame," he said. Immediately he cringed at his ridiculousness. Lavinia didn't seem to mind. She nodded, her bonnet dipping.

"Yes, it was," she agreed, her voice sad. For a long moment she was quiet, and Vincent followed her lead. After what he felt was a respectful pause, he cleared his throat gently.

"M-Miss Everglot," he said, "If I may ask...why aren't you at the funeral? Most of the village is there."

As soon as he asked the question he knew he'd said a dumb thing. How dare he? It was none of his business. He braced himself, prepared for Lavinia to tell him the same. But all she did was reach and lift up her veil, baring her face. Her lovely, round face, with those beautiful eyes. Despite the sad, hollow look in them, they were still beautiful. All Vincent wanted, in that moment, was to see those eyes sparkle.

"Death makes me sad," she said simply. "The cemetery upsets me terribly. Mother and Finis were afraid I would make a scene. I wouldn't have, I don't think...but it's not good for me to be upset."

"Oh," was all he could think to reply. As he looked at her drawn face, and considered her odd tone, he recalled those rumors that she'd been unwell. That she'd spent some time in a spa to the south. None of this put him off, though, not in the slightest. All he felt was an insane desire to help, to make her happy. And, hearing her speak for the first time, he truly felt that he could listen to her talk for the rest of his life.

"Also," Lavinia was saying, a shy note creeping into her voice, "I didn't want to miss you."

Had...had he heard her correctly? He couldn't have done. Vincent looked her shyly in the eye as deeply and as long as he dared, which wasn't very long at all. Eyes on the reins in his hands, he asked, "Miss...me? Y-you wanted...er...to see me?"

"I like to see you," she told him. A smile finally lit up her face, and Vincent couldn't help smiling back. "I look forward to Fridays. You're always so kind to nod to me. I am alone so very often...it's pleasant to have a kind of caller."

She'd noticed. Lavinia Everglot looked forward to his visits. This was mad, he was dreaming, this was all impossible.

"_Ahem_," came a voice. They turned to see the butler, nose in the air, standing on the portico. The French doors were open behind him.

"Miss Everglot," he said, "You are wanted inside." With that, he stepped smartly to one side and gave a little bow, extending an arm toward the mansion's gloomy interior.

"Thank you, Emil," said Lavinia. Her tone gave the impression of a dismissal, but the butler did not move. She turned back to Vincent, and their gazes locked.

"Pleasure to speak with you, Miss Everglot," said Vincent, touching the brim of his cap. He was pleased that his tone was a deferential and pleasant one, particularly because his brain was screaming, _I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOU OH HOW I LOVE YOU_.

"With you as well, Mr. Van Dort," she replied.

"Perhaps I will see you again Friday next?" she asked in a low voice. Vincent had to work very hard not to float away, so light with happiness did he feel. Not only did she apparently enjoy speaking with him, not only was she speaking in a tone meant just for him, Lavinia Everglot wanted to see him again the following week. Him. Vincent Van Dort.

"Oh yes, Miss Everglot," he said, trying and failing to keep his voice low as well. He'd quite forgotten that he might have a new job by next week. And he didn't care. He'd deliver fish anyway. Catch it himself if he had to. He'd come sweep the street in front of her house just to see her again. "I'll even bring trout."

They smiled at one another, and a little spark seemed to fill the space between them. That same sort of jolt that came with touching a doorknob in winter, after one had scuffed one's feet against a carpeted floor. Was it Vincent's overheated imagination, or did Lavinia lean ever so slightly closer, her lips ever so slightly parted, as if to speak again...? From behind them Emil cleared his throat noisily, making Vincent start a bit. As if on a signal they each took a step backward. With the dropping of Lavinia's veil came the feeling that a deep connection had just been broken.

"Goodbye," Lavinia said softly. From behind the heavy veil only the barest hint of the outline of her face was visible. But it did look as though she was smiling. Vincent could only grin, and nod.

He watched her turn and disappear into the gloom of the mansion, careful to take in every last swish of her black skirts, every flutter of her veil. The butler gave a sniff, and met Vincent's eye with a withering and disapproving look. Vincent, still overcome, could only keep grinning.

Next week. Friday next. Lavinia. She wanted to speak with him again. He'd bring trout.

The distant clanging of the crier's bell brought him back to himself. Hastily he rearranged his features into something more sober. It was a day of mourning, after all. It wouldn't do to be seen smiling wide as a harlequin on such a day.

"Easy, Peony," Vincent said, having to tighten his grip on the reins as she sidestepped. "I'll go secure that herring for Miss Plum, and we'll head on, all right?"

In the back of the wagon Vincent, humming a little tune, pulled on his work gloves. The ice kept things nice and chilly in the back of the delivery wagon.

_CLANG CLANG._

The crier must be nearly on top of them. Vincent heard Peony whinny, and the wagon tilted a little. He'd have to get back out there before she reared or bolted.

"Internment completed!" came the crier's call. "Mourning party returning! Reception to follow! Hear ye!"

The noise proved too much for poor Peony. She whinnied again, and the sound of her hoofbeats on the cobblestones as she reared twice were plainly audible. When the wagon lurched, Vincent lost his balance and fell to the floor, hitting the back of his head, hard, against one of the icebox compartments. Dazed, he gingerly touched the sore, stinging back of his head. His fingers came away wet, and he winced to see blood glistening on his fingertips. He must have hit the sharp edge of the latch just right.

The carriage jolted again, and Vincent jolted with it. A creak from above made him look up. A few chips of ice dripped and fell around him. Before he could move out of the way, the ten-pound block of ice that had been keeping the herring cool followed. Instinctively he put up an arm to shield himself, but it didn't do any good.

0—0

"Bly me, a fresh one!"

Vincent's eyes snapped open. He was lying on his back in the middle of the square. The sky above him was dark, and someone had strung up colored lights. He must have been out for a while. Two faces leaned over him. The evening light made the men's faces appear blue.

"All right there, lad?" asked the same voice that had spoken earlier. It belonged to the man with the enormous chin and handlebar mustache. Vincent nodded, surprised when he felt no pain. With ease he sat up, the men leaning over him stepping back a bit to give him room.

"I'm j-just fine, sir," he replied, checking the back of his head again. He felt no wet blood this time. And, oddly, no sting at all. "Thank you for-"

Vincent froze, mouth agape. Slowly he looked from face to face. These were faces he knew. In a village the size of the one they resided in, there were few faces one didn't know. These were faces he wasn't supposed to see ever again.

"B-but you're...you've been...you're dead, sir! Sirs!" he cried, scrambling to his feet. "Both of you died!"

"Well, what of it?" asked the late General Elvstead, twirling his mustache and looking Vincent up and down. "You're dead, too."

"Don't make a spectacle of yourself, boy," added the recently deceased Lord Everglot. For that was who the second man was, Vincent saw now. Periwig and all. Death had hollowed his eyes a bit, but he still looked more or less the same as he had the last time Vincent had seen him being wheeled about the square. At least here he could walk on his own again.

Vincent opened and closed his mouth a few times. Fear was rising within him. Glancing around frantically, he knew they were right. This was a strange perversion of the village square he knew. Tilted and dark and crawling with spiders and purple and green lights and empty coffins everywhere and the statue was a skeletal horse and there went a half-rotted corpse pushing a wheelbarrow and nothing was where it was supposed to be and neither was he and this was _all wrong_.

It was then Vincent learned that the dead cannot faint. For some strange reason this was a comfort, but a comfort that left him deflated.

"It...it was just herring on ice," Vincent said, his voice feeble. He cradled his head in his hands. "It...it's not possible, I can't be. I'm dreaming. Soon I'll wake up, and this will all have been a nightmare."

"Denial," said Lord Everglot wisely, and Elvstead nodded. "I'll catch you up, Elvs-er, Vitgenshtein. Order us a dry sherry, will you?"

Elvstead, or Vitgenshtein, walked away, leaving Lord Everglot and Vincent together by the statue. Bones creaked as the dead horse turned to look down at Vincent. With a pang he was reminded of Peony. He'd never see her again. Vincent sank to the ground.

Over. Life was over, over. Finished. After a mere twenty-five largely useless years, Vincent Van Dort was finished. Just when his life was starting to seem not quite so useless after all. To seem as though there was at least the hope of a new start.

And Lavinia. Lavinia Everglot might have loved him. At least a little. And now he'd lost her forever.

Once, Vincent wouldn't have thought it possible for a dead heart to break, to be ripped in half and then to shatter to pieces. But it was possible. Everything he'd lost seemed represented by Lavinia's face, as she'd smiled at him, told him that she looked forward to his visits. Rage, a relatively foreign emotion for Vincent, tore and gnashed its way through him. Even he was surprised by the force of it. Before he could think, before he could stop himself, he raised a fist and threw a wild punch at the base of the statue. He heard a finger break, but didn't feel it, so he reared back and punched again.

"Now then, that's a bit _much_," said Lord Everglot, his voice a disapproving grumble.

"But it isn't _fair_!" he shouted, his voice sounding strangled and tight. He'd never so much as raised his voice in life. Especially not to Lord Everglot. But who cared now? If only he'd been able to stay, if only he'd gotten to know Lavinia better...he might have been part of the family.

If only...if only. If only he'd had a little more _time_.

"Please!" Vincent begged, falling to his knees before a befuddled looking Lord Everglot. "Please, your Lordship, there _must _be something you can do. Just a little more time, please. I need to be alive again. Just for a little while. Just to...just to...talk to someone. I promise, it won't be long." Frantic and desperate, he grabbed Lord Everglot's hand in both of his own, begging on his knees.

Embarrassed, Lord Everglot glanced around at all of the skeletons who'd gathered on the edges of the square to watch the show. "You're embarrassing yourself, boy, get up," he said, trying to pull his hand away. But Vincent didn't let go.

"I promise, your Lordship!" he said. "Please help me, I'll owe you...well, not my life, but my death. I don't know. Anything. Anything you like. Just please tell me how to get back to the living, just for a little while. I swear to you that's all I need."

Lord Everglot managed to free his hand with an almighty wrench. He stepped out of Vincent's range. Something almost like pity seemed to cross his features as he adjusted his periwig. "Nothing will help. You've died. That's all there is to it. My condolences, but there is nothing to be done."

There were murmurs of both pity and agreement from the assembled dead. All Vincent could do was kneel there on the ground, watching a little parade of worms and maggots squirm their way across the cobblestones. Lord Everglot's words rung in his head. His Lordship was right. An impossible fool, that's what Vincent Van Dort was. Even in death. Vincent buried his face in his hands. He felt empty. No more anger, no more despair. No feelings at all. It was as though his heart, useless and unbeating now, was gone.

"What's the point?" he said in a monotone to no one in particular. He heard footsteps and voices as the crowd dispersed, off to find more interesting things. Not that Vincent cared. "What was the point? What was all of that _for_, just to die? Why did I bother?"

Lord Everglot gave a grumble, as if to speak, but Elvstead's voice broke in just then.

"Plowing right through the process, eh?" he asked. Peeking through his fingers, Vincent watched him hand Lord Everglot a sherry glass filled with a purple fizzing liquid. Elvstead kept a stein for himself, and hoisted it to his mouth. Wiping yellow foam from his mustache, he regarded Vincent there on the ground.

"Must be a record, I'd say," he said. "At this rate you'll be at acceptance before you know it...Van Dort, isn't it? The fishmonger?"

At that, Lord Everglot nearly spat out the sip of his drink he'd just taken. Vincent and Elvstead stared as he collected himself. "Not _Vincent_?" he asked slowly. Wondering, but lacking the energy to be fearful, Vincent nodded.

For a long moment Lord Everglot and Vincent stared at each other. Then, abruptly, Lord Everglot quaffed the rest of his drink, adjusted his periwig, and turned to leave.

"Thank you," he grumbled to Vincent over his shoulder, "for brightening up my granddaughter's Fridays."

Without waiting for a response, Lord Everglot walked away, swiftly disappearing into a doorway beneath a rickety sign shaped like a death's head, which read _Ball and Socket Pub. _Vincent gaped, his dead brain swirling with questions. Elvstead took a draw from his stein. Much to Vincent's embarrassment, he then tipped a sly wink.

"'Brightening up her Fridays,' eh?" he asked, and Vincent wanted to die. Again. Elvstead only chuckled.

"Meet us in the pub, if you've a care," he said, starting off the way Lord Everglot had gone. "My missus plays quite a polka." And he winked once more.

Vincent sat there on the ground, staring off into the middle distance. Skeletons came and went, some offering greetings. But Vincent hardly noticed them. Lavinia had cared. Enough that her grandfather knew. And her grandfather didn't mind. With the clarity death seemed to bring, Vincent knew Lord Everglot only didn't mind because they were dead. It didn't seem to matter much.

But what did matter was that he'd had an impact. A tiny one, but still. Monsieur Paul and Miss Plum had wanted to work with him. Peony had depended on him. Vincent Van Dort had been liked.

Vincent Van Dort had brightened up Lavinia Everglot's Fridays. Somehow, from here on the ground in the land of the dead, that seemed to be worth quite a lot. His only regret was that he wouldn't be able to do it again. He hoped, desperately, that his death wouldn't upset her _too_ much. She was delicate, after all. It was too bad there wasn't much he could do from down here. Except follow Lord Everglot's lead. It seemed the best, indeed only, thing to do at the moment.

Nodding to himself, Vincent pulled himself to his feet, and made off for the pub.


End file.
